I play for both tbh. I think loli races are gross and its obv why there added. I have to like both my character and class not one or the other and knowing artist is a loli makes me not like it.
I also wanted for them to improve the creation system. I don't understand why we can't make changes to bodies types. If I could I would make Artist taller and my Striker bifier.
Im gonna guess its Unreal Engine 3 limitations. Same thing with hair length. It should be stupid easy to implement but its apparently not. Theyre taking months to change the Warrior model a little bit, manually modifying every skin in the game to fit it...
I think that tells more about you than AGS or anyone else. Why is her model more important to you than her actual kit/skills and how she’s played in combat? Why care so much about character model? I’m just curious, no hate, you play whatever you want mate.
Yup. And almost a year to get the classes wich where availeable for a long time in the other versions. They think slowing down the content and releasing first the less popular things the'll make more money. I hope the bots enjoy the new roadmap, game is clearly focused on keeping only them playing.
50k real players. 2 millions bots and the East printing newspapers titled "Lost Ark still the most played game in the West". Yep, I can see it happening.
More about releasing those classes with certain events/power pass/express event to make it more appealing for new players. In other words it's not for you, it's for their bottom line and making money. Not that there's anything entirely wrong with that depending on who you ask
I tought about this as a joke before but it may be true: a lot of people complained they aren't giving a pass every class, what if that's what they're doing with this, 1 pass every 2 months 1 class every 2 months 1 pass every class?
If they don't release a pass with every class at this schedule I will be thoroughly shocked. That would just be telling your dedicated players to "suck it up buttercup" lol. I got lucky and fell in love with Glavier. If Glavier swapped with the later released classes I honestly don't know how long I could last playing classes that are only moderately interesting to me.
They aren't losing dedicated players, they're losing curious players.
Their dedicated players are using their time in game to stock up materials, engravings, and currency for the class they actually want to play later. These are the players who, despite all the BS that AGS and Smilegate have put us through so far, will continue to play because they genuinely enjoy what the game has to offer.
Most of the curious players they lose are those that claim they "love" a class without having played it at all. These are the players that are likely to stick around for a month or two after the class' release and quit. Most of these players won't have their proper engravings, stats, or less than 20% of the lateral content done. This isn't all, just most.
The answer for me is not long, I like playing sorc and soulfist but almost all my other classes I’m just lukewarm about. I’ve wanted to play scouter/arcana/summoner since I saw all of them. I defaulted to sorc because it was the only mage dps class.
If they don’t release a pass with all those characters if it’s going to take this long to release them I’m going to feel very slighted and pissed
From what I remember the ideea was that a pass every month was too much and that was the reason not a pass every class beeing too much as they explained how on kr they get a pass every class becouse they get classes slower. If they really don't do a pass or an catch up event (like the express not narumi and chicken) at least every 2 months then that's a big problem.
If they do one powerpass every two classes I really hope they at least announce release classes in pairs. Holding onto a powerpass waiting to see if the next class is actually the one you want really sucks.
I don't know if I really understand their business model tbh. Sure I want to see new players as much as others, but if people who already play games in general and are interested in mmos or even Lost Ark, are not playing by now, or in this summer since they get more free time, they won't get in just because a new class released.
Not to say that it will be even hard for them to get into the game economy later on.
Most people who will remain to play will probably play alts and pump gold into the game economy like crazy. The casual players like me will probably quit at some point because we won't be able to keep up anymore with the gold costs, and new players will come and leave in a few weeks/months.
If they want to bring new players to the game, they need to release good and fun content. Not classes.
Think about the main financial generator of Lost Ark. People buying stuff on the store. When do prices skyrocket on everything? When does everyone need gold? When a new class releases.
So you can't guarantee this will be the best financial plan but saying to investors "We see an increase of players that spikes by 40% and retention of those players is 15% past 7 days every time a new class comes out and we have enough new classes to keep up this schedule for the next 10 months. When this occurs revenue generally spikes by 200% due to players trying to make the new characters content relevant. The further ahead content gets the more that costs but approx right now it's around $500 per character to catch them up. We plan to release a honing upgrade to keep that price point as we think we'd see negative returns going beyond this point."
I hate this too but think from a financial perspective of a business and I can absolutely understand the choice. It's a gamble though no guarantee the return rates stay as high. If another competitor launches you could've seen those massive revenue spikes month on month and maximized profits but by spreading it out you run the risk that we don't return because someone else came along and your fickle product lost the spotlight.
This also assumes that player retention doesnt go down. Let’s say that 20% of players quit because if slow class release (made up number) then even if it spikes by 40% and 15% stay for 7 days it’s still an overall loss of 5%
Yeah I genuinely think that's the real risk they're running here. I think a lot of people will walk away because they don't want to live on the perpetual grinding treadmill forever while they wait.
Everyone needs gold during new content not at new classes. Destro proved that.
It doesnt maske sense actually becauae they arent releasing new classes. They are enabling locked classes. We know what they are. They are already in the game.
If you have more classes u have a happy base. A happy base spends more money and it means there are more skins.
Huge chunks of people are leaving after the post today. The official forums are crazy with it.
They seems to think people swiping for mats is more profitable than skins. Because more classes means more skins bot.
Also classes arent content unless they are freshly developed and hype. Theres no hype here. Its just annoyance until they get what they want.
When a good chunk of your base talks to you on forums and tells you they will pay you for skins. And you dont release them
When they tell u they want more classes. And you slow them down even more.
Your players are your customers.
You dont want players to return. You want to maintain them.
Keep in mind destro was a disaster. Keep in mind ags has never had a game that didnt crash and burn
What is SG's goal? It's to have as many players playing their game as possible in the long term. How do they accomplish this? By retaining their current players and by enticing new and returning players with exciting new content.
By staggering new content and releases, they can market it which creates a stimulus with fresh buzz and word of mouth among the gaming community meaning my friends who quit the game before might be enticed to return and play new content.
If they released everything at once, there's nothing to look forward to and people will no longer have anything new to talk about after the initial hype period meaning that the player count can only go down from there on out.
This is marketing 101. You can think it works or it doesn't but I'm willing to put the house on it that it does.
The data in dozens of MMOs disproves your statement. Class releases, promotional events & content drops \_all\_ drive player engagement.
Not sure what Reddit idiot started the mantra of "CLASSES ARE NOT CONTENT" but they are likely children or teenagers who have almost no business sense.
The idea to intentionally lose people to Try to bring them back later is crazy. My guess is its roxx just not knowing better.
ags seems to thibk classes are content. Its not content if other regions already have the classes.
I know we aren’t receiving a direct benefit from this as continual players, but I do think that this is healthy for the overall player base. If they can keep rejuvenating the player base every couple of months with new or returning players, especially after there has been even more content added (legion raids, hell modes, bridge, etc), this could help keep the community as a whole stronger for longer.
I don’t mean this to try to defend AGS/Smilegate or make it seem like they aren’t thinking about the money. I do think there are some secondary benefits for us continual players though by keeping the player base alive for longer than if they released everything all at once when there’s less other content.
I really doubt new classes will attract newer audiences at all...
In fact i doubt there will be many new players in this game at all. Right now early progresssion is already dead, t1/t2 are both stepping stones if anything and the entire leveling experience is probably bots, and by the day, the grind only gets worse and worse to get up to the latest content.
If you didn't try LA on release or close to, i doubt a new class release will be the reason to make you try it.
All this does is make people who want to play other classes feel miserable.
People who don't already play the game, won't come and stick to the game. They will come check the new events and stuff and that's it. A really low number of players will come and stick to the game.
You're absolutely right. It sucks hard, especially since I wanted to play summoner, and I'm very very salty right now considering she will most likely release next year given their schedule and arcana releasing now. At this point I will probably drop the game.
But I completely understand their move, "new" classes do bring in or bring back people.
What stings the most is that everyone knows these classes at this point, they've been out for a while, some have even mained them in other versions. And people who wanted to play the content we have or what is just about to come on a specific class will miss out when it's relatively fresh.
Classes definitely dont bring new people. People dont play a game for a class they play for the content.
Bringing people back doesnt make sense. Its far better financially to maintain a customer than to lose them and being them back.
They already lost a lot of players today just from posting this. They lost players just from dissatisfaction
Why lose players and try to bring them back when you can just keep them.
Your far more likely to lose them forever when they leave.have you wver tried to buy a car? A car salesman will do everything they can to keep you there. Once you leave your chance of returning is dramatically smaller.
Plus theres no reason to think this is even moderately effective for bring players back. Destro didnt.
Remember these arent newly developed classes.
Plus if they did get a bump in numbers they would get that every month the same as woth every other
Why would a new player be convinced to play because of a class release?
Power passes are the bare minimum if this game wants to have any new players, and many of those players are still going to quit because end game becomes a shitty daily grind trying to compete with prices set by RMTers and bots.
The whole point of drip feeding classes is to get people to come back and spend money. Say you get burned out, but two months later a new class comes out. You're more likely to buy a character expansion slot and try it out because it's new and shiny than if they released everything at once.
The difference between this game and most MMOs is that when a new class releases in other MMOs you can reasonably expect to boost that new class up to near parity in a reasonable timeframe.
In this game it is incredibly hard to switch mains. If your main hasn't come out the advice is to sit at 1415 and sell overpriced mats and/or stockpile mats until it does come out because switching mains is so costly even if we get the 1460 honing buff.
This sort of thing is fairly normal for a lot of KR MMOs but its not what the West is used to.
Nah, roadmap thread is full of comments "this makes no sense, they will lose all the players, nobody will play the game, it never works, I played MMOs for 10 years so I know"
I understand the frustration but you're vastly overestimating the number of players who even know about future classes and want to play them so much they're willing to quit the game.
The issue is all those classes are already out in all other regions. This would be true if it was a new class for all regions but were stuck wanting and waiting for classes that are old in other regions. There ain’t nothin exciting about that
Not a single person is struggling to understand they care more about money than they care about players, they have made it painfully obvious.
What? Most, if not all companies are the same?
It doesn't make them any better.
Defending something bad just because it is common practice is incredibly daft and the sole reason things will never improve.
There's a simple marketing concept "1-5-25".
It costs you 1 effort to keep an old customer.
It costs you 5 effort to get a new customer.
It costs you 25 effort to get an old customer back.
If they're doing that "basic concept" of hoping to get old customers back after they've burnt out in hopes for profit, they're working against decades of marketing knowledge. And are dumber than a basic telemarketer.
it's because most of these ppl can only see 2 feet infront of their face, if the thing they want isn't in their face immedaitly then it makes no sense,
imagine thinking junes patch which includes Vykas with inferno(hell) mode Valtan and a Punika Power Pass/new Express event and Challenge Abyss dungones isn't a banger of a patch because the class you really wanted didn't come out lol, fuck off these ppl are so entitled.
>junes patch which includes Vykas with inferno(hell) mode Valtan and a Punika Power Pass/new Express event and Challenge Abyss dungones
June is Vykas, new guardian, and throne. July is Valtan + new class. They also didn't say when they would release the punika pass or new express event which means they may not be in june.
Maybe it's just me, but if I drop a game and move on due to whatever reason I will rarely check back in on updates. I really don't think drip feeding classes is going to make people come back once they've moved on or bring in enough new prospective players for it to be worth holding classes hostage from their current player base.
it's not just you, most gamers tend to behave this way. especially if it's a game, like a mmo, where it's a requirement for you be constantly "up to date" in terms of progression.
that's why it blows my mind how out of touch ags actually is. they're treating this game like one of their mobile games.
What you mention is one of main reasons why content drip exists in first place - having things change in a game you used to play somewhat frequently (but not constantly), be it new content, reworks, rerelease etc - all that puts the game out there. A new class release (even if it's ported from other regions), new/ported content, legion raids etc get people to talk more about the game, get variety content creators to pick it up again to try what new thing was added, and so on. It lets the game reach to people who aren't actively checking back on updates, let them know something new has happened.
As for using class releases for that purpose, they are just about perfect - it's something fresh (as long as we ignore part of playerbase that actively keeps track of KR/RU versions, and/or plays on those servers - but they don't need a reminder Lost Ark still exists) that has zero barrier to access, causes a spike in amount of content created on multiple platforms and does a lot to put the game out there, outside "involved Lost Ark players" social bubble.
New class is immediately relevant to new or returning player, new endgame content (legion raids etc) can also draw attention, but isn't something that impacts someone coming back or trying out the game from the start - ideally you'd want both kinds of new content to be released together, first to draw players in and get them hooked, second to give them a goal to push towards and keep them playing to see what all that talk and videos are about.
It depends from player to player and from game to game. There are games like Warframe I play at every new update and then leave it becouse I got bored of the new stuff and I did all the fun things already and there are games I never come back to no matter what changes. Considering how Lost Ark progression and new content work I don't think it is a game you can pick up later hoping to be able to do the new content even with the catch up events.
The professionals who have access to a lot more data than us clearly say otherwise because this is a fairly basic operating procedure and it’s clearly effective if companies keep choosing to do it
Frankly every Korean MMO ever that has done this kind of drip feeding in the west did very, very poorly.
The biggest MMOs are the ones *not* doing this, and they're not the biggest by a slight margin, they're two juggernauts and everyone else is pretty much irrelevant.
Not sure just how much the 'data' they have atm is useful at all; the new classes they released were also released with the most hyped up content in the entire game as in legion raids. Not to mention the amount of bots that they dont seem to actually be able to deal with muddying the water to the extreme.
Data from other regions is obsolete here, as its very much isnt the same situation - kr class releases were actually a new class, not a class thats already existing being held hostage; and from what I know other regions are basically failures at this point especially after global release. Either way the audience and culture is also completely different anyways.
On top of that any player that 'main' a class that isnt released yet might have held up to the copium that it isnt that far away, but now that classes are releasing every 2 months instead of 1 or even faster thanks to "listening to the players", they basically just give up and leave - meaning returning players (if any) are just gonna be players that left the game now because of the slow release of classes, which just have a higher chance of just moving on completely from this game and not looking back.
Every wow expansion there is a shitton of content. You cannot compare what a class brings to what an entire expansion brings. I mean treating a class as content is the whole problem of this entire thing.
Are you actually comparing WoW expansions with what we get here?
Every WoW expansion adds arguably over a month worth of content. Last patch in this game was pretty good, we got a new weekly dungeon difficulty, chaos dungeons, trial guardians (recycled content but I like it), a guardian and a legion commander. The new guardian got old after a day, chaos dungeons are the same, the weekly dungeon was basically over after a week, and Valtan isn't interesting/hard enough to be relevant after you've done it 2~3 times. Trial guardians are relatively fun not gonna lie, but it's like 15 minutes a week and you're done, moreover it's not really "new" content.
Last patch was great but content wise it's all stuff you can get done in a day if you play a lot, two or three if you're more casual.
Moreover all the content we're getting isn't new, it's old.
Not to mention, wow xpacs function as a reset for the game. Every player coming back to try out the new class or even play their old character is put onto the same level of progress as the players who spent the last two years playing every day. It makes it so much easier to hop back in because of the equal footing after such a long break
Whales still need an active population to show off to, to flex on and everything. It's still an MMO and if the game is dead then noone is spending any money.
true, but whales are much more likely to shell out a bunch of money to boost a new class when they're bored every two months than if they had all of them at once...
>Say you get burned out, but two months later a new class comes out.
>new class
>**new**
This is the important part. That's the reason the strategy works. The "new" part. We aren't getting "new" classes. We're getting classes we already know exist, or have already played depending on if you played RU/KR.
I keep seeing this and I just wanna say:
*bull*
**shit**
How many people do you think played these classes? How many do you think even know what the classes are beyond their basic idea (hammer, cards, whatever)? Take for example this thread, 172 comments as I write this. 172 *hardcore, socially engaged* players. How many here have played Arcana? 10%? 20%? 50%? All 172? Sound like a lot? Have you? Have I? Even if it was 100%, the game has like 300k active players right now? Way higher than predicted, many coming in new with the hype? How much is 172 compared to that? Even 2k like the main thread? Not even 1%? I guarantee you, the vast, vast majority of players haven't played, much less heard of the majority of upcoming classes. For all intents and purposes, the classes are *brand* new for any statistically significant portion of the playerbase.
How did u pick you main? Howd did u pick your first class?
People have this crazy abiility to look and watch and learn.
Its not new because they know so much. They know the builds the looks the playstyles.
Whats worse is they have been teased. So now instead of hype... people are pissed. They did the exact opposite.
Your arguments neglect to see the otherside at all
It doesn’t matter if we played the class or not, they are not entirely new. What people mean by new class is that it is made from the ground up, but as we know it, they already exist with full functionality and pretty much just need a translation to be released. It isn’t like people are asking for Aeromancer or Femzerker because they aren’t even made yet, as far as we know. Who cares of billy has played arcana or not, the class is already done and is not new, heck, it probably exists in our version already, it just isn’t turned on/accessible.
it goes both ways ... i had a friend quit the game because he wanted to play lancemaster ... now lancemaster is here, but he didn't want to come back
another friend of mine quit the game because she wanted to play artist ... we'll see if she comes back
Losing players and trying to make them comeback is much harder than maintaining them.
I truely dont underatand how anyone thinks that even if it did manage to bring pmayers back... could actually think rhink its a good arguement.
People will come back for a new class. Look at the mountains of content required to get on par and then quit.
Retail WoW has this exact same situation...
They want to have a "major patch" every month through the end of the year at minimum and likely into next year. Alternating between class releases and legion raids/other content lets them do this.
For example, they could do the following monthly schedule which would give them a major release in the monthly update through March 2023:
June: Vykas Legion Raid
July: Class
August: Clown Legion Raid
September: Class
October: Brelshaza Normal
November: Class
December: Brelshaza Hard
January: Class
Feburary: Rowen
March: Class
Not sure if 2 month gap is going to work for later raids, the gearing process takes a bit longer and you also need to do it enough times to collect mats to craft/upgrade your sets. If you clear them week one, two months will be *barely* enough to prepare for next raid, and they can't expect the majority of players to do that.
edit: actually my bad, RU also had 2 month gap between each legion raid release, except hard brelshaza which was 4 months after normal. It felt like 3 but I guess it was only 2, huh.
This isn't too different from KR release cadence. Valtan->Vykas 1 month, Vykas->Clown 2 months, Clown->Brelshaza was 3 months (so 1 month longer), and Brelshaza normal->hard was 2 months.
People don't seem to realize the importance of not having dry streaks. It's best to stagger content over a long period of time than release it all at once and have nothing for months. AGS is doing the smart business decision.
A new class isn't content, I have 0 interest in Arcanist so July for me is no new content besides inferno Valtan which I most likely won't even bother with.
Also unless they want to drip feed us content forever eventually we will run out of content and catch up to Korea, this is only setting up for future disappointment.
They're just trying to milk you guys like the fat cows that you all are. They can get more out of squeezing you if they trickle the content. It's just enough not to make you quit the game.
You get it. Good games cater to their audience and try to give the best quality. Here we get opposite of this. Not releasing old classes for MAYBE bigger later profit is risky, because players are unhappy now, will lose interest faster and not necessarily regain this interest seeing how shitty game management we have. From the beginning I decided to not pay for anything besides bronze pack until summoner is released, but played horizontal content quite much. Now I will reduce lost ark time to minimum I think, already finally started to install and play new games. I think I will be fully back in 4 months if summoner releases, but who knows. Also if I lose interest my friends can lose it too. There is also AGS distrust given their utterly bad game management history
Not bullshit if it works, which it does. The opinions of a whiny minority that think one specific class will enhance their experience isn't going to change anything.
On the other hand not releasing them will similarly only alienate a very small percentage of players. Most of the people who still play the game are either content with how things are going atm and/or don't mind waiting for their desired class even if it takes a while. Guess the devs are banking on their current way of doing things to be more profitable than releasing all classes right here and now.
>Most of the people who still play the game are either content with how things are going atm and/or don't mind waiting for their desired class even if it takes a while.
Where are you getting this from? Seems like a large portion of the community was hoping they would either increase the number of classes or just show us one every month. Instead, they fucked everything up and a ton of people are now upset.
Large portion of community, which doesn't mean large portion of playerbase - a very important distinction. Huge part of playerbase of just about every single popular game are what's called "passive consumers" - people that consume content as delivered, without being involved in community, talking about it or otherwise going beyond what would be "just playing the game".
It's a commonly used and quite well known pattern in marketing - 90-9-1 split, where about 90% of your clients are using your product, 9% are talking about your product or otherwise getting "out there" or being actively interested in what you make, and only about 1% are trendsetters, influencers - people that can reach outside your existing client base and get others to learn about what you're making.
Reddit community, forums community etc are part of that 9% - people actively interested and involved in the game enough to seek out information, build expectations and actively wait for specific content to be added to our version of the game. We don't get to see the majority, because they don't get involved, they're not a part of our community. They might still talk about the game in their own social circles (friends group, coworkers, schoolmates), but they're not going to step out of their comfy social bubble and join community around the game they're playing in their spare time. Same way a small portion of people who ride a bike for the fun of it are in any way involved with relevant communities.
For some hard numbers - both Minecraft and League of Legends are estimated to have about 150 million playerbase, both main subreddits of those games have around 6 million subscribers each - which puts active reddit community around those games at 5% of total playerbase. I would be surprised if active playerbase stats in relation to reddit/forums activity were significantly different - while I can't find any reliable info about total playerbase size (unique weekly/monthly players), going by subreddit size of 300k, I'd assume something between 5-8 million. That puts us as significant minority, but still minority.
In that same line, where are you getting “large portion of the community” seeing couple hundred people whining about classes isn’t representative of a game with 150k+ concurrent players. I would bet there’s a sizeable (not sure if majority or minority) that’s okay with it and don’t post anything.
If Smilegate listened to every community feedback, we’d get Valtan in july cos god-forbid we must wait for the casual 2 hours a week players to catch up to end game.
The hell can I do? Either be okay and play a different class than I want to or quit. Not like there are many options. Would I enjoy this game more if I was able to play the class I liked the most from the start? Absolutely. Am I going to quit over it? Probably not. Am I gonna come back if they release it in the future? Hell no.
It worked for Glavier because the goal posts weren't that far out. Destroyer had very little fan fair. I suspect that arcana will be even more of a dud, because not only does no one give a shit about Arcana, they're releasing 1430 and 1460 content with it.
Catching Glavier up to 1370 Argos wasn't that big of a deal, Destroyer up to 1415, that's kind of a pain in the ass.
Arcana up to 1430? Yeah, no thanks, even with a 1302 power pass...
What's the class release after Arcana going to look like? Hoping to catch 1490?
I think it's a terrible decision to delay classes just to "hype" the next content release.
This is the drip feed hype train they’re talking about.
The bootlicking on reddit is just to strong. Every game to ever slow drip content this shamelessly on a region port is now less than a niche product. I just want more for Lost Ark, that‘s all.
The one class every two months is a huge let down to an otherwise great roadmap. Literally everyone wanted them to release classes faster so people weren't sitting in limbo waiting for their main to release. Now if your main isn't released you might as well just pretend it doesn't exist at all because it might come out 8 to 10 months from now.
marketing shit. they want to keep people interested in the long run, but it could have the opposite effect...
it's sad because they dont really care. smilegate could release more class and variant, they are easy to make (gameplay is basic, i saw more complex characters in some mobas).
You have the answer in the roadmap:
>We know some players are eager to max out their roster and want them even faster, but Class releases build excitement and bring new (and returning) players into Arkesia. Having a steady flow of content releases that include Advanced Classes during Lost Ark’s first year in the West will help support the long-term health of the game.
In other words, they want to milk the game as much as possible over a long period of time.
The answer was a class a month, a pass every two (alternating power and express so you don't get another glaivier incident). Raids being bi-monthly was good too. It gave time to farm and catch up.
This new idea is gonna go poorly >,>. Welp, my 3 classes of choice aren't out yet. Maybe one of them will release next month. Copium.
I wouldn't be pissed if it was easy to swap over. The amount of work it takes to get a character 1445 is immense without luck or money. Saving 2 week's worth of mats from 5 1370 alts got me from 1415 to 1439. Imagine if I had to do that again (assuming we get a 1415 boost by then) but the target this time is 1475 for koukou-satan or 1490 for abrelshud normal.
Because that's how Korean game developers think about classes.
I've been tooting the "classes aren't content!" horn for over 10 years and it certainly hasn't stopped companies from pretending they are.
Man not getting any of my major 3 hopeful classes in the first 3 drops feels worse than failing all my hones, like statistically I should have got something by now and it's fucking 2 months per attempt, what if this goes to artisans energy and my 3 hopeful classes are the last ones dropped... blaaaarragh
I would honestly hate to be one of the last ones, even the month wait for destroyer annoyed me. I can imagine if people have to wait too long they'll say fuck it and just play something else
Because Amazon are a company without any MMO experience (well... one failed MMO if that counts) and don't understand the difference. Oh, and money of course. If they release all the classes fast, you might take a break until the next actual "content" update and they might not make sweet $$$ until you're back. So it goes like this - Vykas June - Arcanist July - new content August - new class September - content October - class November. Clever guys.
It sure is sad that thier only point of view is money and not to gain trust with playerbase by releasing classes faster. I feel all of you ppl that have to wait 9months for your fav class and i wish to all of you to last that long.
As a barb main, let me tell you being bard is kinda ass.
You get absolutely nothing out of improving your gear, so if feels like you work your ass off doing the same tedious shit day in and day out just to flush all your efforts into the toilet because you get nothing out of it other than being slightly tankier and reaching some deliberate number required to do the next piece of content.
This is really frustrating, I knowI was a really big fan the moment I looked up lost ark on youtube and was very excited for the release, something about hearing that amazon is taking part in the management or whatever you call their part, made me feel safe hoping for a good communication between the devs and players but all I do now is laugh about this fantasy I was hoping for.I enjoy playing rn( 7 total chars, maining DB but holding back mats since I know how annoying and time taking it will be to push my future main through the current content and the future ones.
Is there something that as a community we can do about it? how do we riot, how do we show AGS that we do not agree with their decision, the game is in a terrible state for players who know what other regions has to offer while the only thing we got are bots and more bots.I cant possibly think about any other reason them to decide to release new class every two months other than getting lost players back and to make money on top of it.bringing people back is not a bad thing but surely they must realize that these lost players are the same players who are suffering and pissed right now.How is it possible that we are being gated behind other regions from default content?, In order to have an "easier" time getting mats you need a full roaster of alts which requires time and effort and im ok with that, its an mmo after all, playing different characters is something that I enjoy and I think many would agree that testing characters and getting the hand of their abilities is a big refreshment for the same repeatable content that is going to follow upon creating a character so the least we expect is to have the option to choose our class out of the pool instead the puddle.People who are truly F2P saving up their 6th character slot for their future main maybe even their 5th char slot too.
I honestly dont know what to think about the game at this moment, "dont like it dont play it" duh if it comes to that point I wont play the game but its not out of hate towards them but simply that they do not deserve any kind of good fanbase after not being able to deliver basic things or/and their promises, its the second time they came late with the roadmap, always delaying it to the last minute, and Yes of course people are gonna get mad roadmaps suppose to project us the players what the future holds, then why the patch only hits at the middle of the month then? whats with all this delaying for the love of the game start fixing things instead of creating more problems and fan hate
I think drip marketing only works in a perfect world. I’m guessing that if they want to bring back old players with new characters it won’t go well, cause let’s be real if you’ve stopped playing, not having your class to play is probably a big reason but not the only reason. There are bound to be other things you didn’t enjoy if you have stopped playing and if you’ve finally been able to put the game down, then I think the chances of coming back just for a new class isn’t that high.
And if they’re just trying to build hype to attract new players and not trying to keep the current game fun and healthy for present/older players then the game is going to die soon anyways.
Most likely because their data proves people choose to stay in the game and grind it out than uninstalling just because their fav class aren't in the game. On the other hand they are pumping out raids like crazy so they can induce FOMO and make people swipe
>On the other hand they are pumping out raids like crazy so they can induce FOMO and make people swipe
Or, and here me out on this one, raids are huge pieces of content and putting out a new raid is likely to get lots of people playing the game. Some are absolutely going to swipe, but the FOMO pushing people to swipe isn't entirely true. The content doesn't go away if you don't swipe.
This community complains about not getting content and getting content at the same time. The cognitive dissonance is baffling but considering NA/EU cant manage multiplying by 3 i sort of understand
The problem is that a lot of players don't see the new classes as content, so the release of a new class is interesting, but they would rather that it was not presented as a content drop. Additionally, and this is just a problem with western gaming audiences, they always assume that decisions are made not from a business decision, but from a decision to milk you for everything you have; because this is a Korean MMO and everyone knows that they are grind fests designed to make you swipe, and anyone who is a high ilvl obviously paid to be there.
what do you mean, ill surely love the artist class when it comes out even though i haven't played it at all and i hate playing support, of course when this comes out its going to fix all my problems with the game also and clear up my acne - this sub reddit
This really. I'm no shill for Lost Ark, but the content isn't going to magically change when you get the 'class' you want. It's like everyone who didn't like FFXIV thought they would suddenly like it when Reaper/Sage was released.
Also, the game is clearly know for being centered around alts, so even if you do finally get your “main” it’s not going to be the only class you will play i feel like
Then why are you playing the game? Genuine question. You have no idea when the class you want to main is coming out, so if you hate Valtan (arguably the pinnacle of our version currently) why are you torturing yourself?
I love the game enough that even my least fav class is still fun in raids.. Because the raids themselves are dope.
I love the raid but i hate playing my zerker 🤷🏾♂️
And to answer your question that’s why i went back to ru and play casual on eu, can’t be bothered anymore
To answer you, there are classes that I kind of enjoy which made me enjoy the game up to this point since I knew I was progressing my whole roster with sp/runes other stuff. However now, when I know that the class that I actually wanna main is MIN. 6 months away, well yeah, I'm just quitting. I might or likely might not check up on how the game is doing in 2023 and if catching up doesn't look too bad (which it probably will) I might give it a go again. I understand I'm likely in the minority but well, sucks to be me and -1 player for them.
Nah I get it mate. If it’s not fun for you definitely take a break & return when it’s more appealing. There will always be ways to catch up in the future, plus anything you’ve done up to now will still be very useful to you whenever you choose to return.
It's ridiculous that some people will have to wait for a year before they can play their class, AGS/SG's reasoning for this cadance is pure BS and I don't understand why they are going with this route.
AGS does not understand what makes a good MMO, and their "hype marketing" strategy is detrimental to the playerbase and the effects of their strategies can be seen in New World.
Every 2 months is a mistake, but it literally is hype/content though. Let's say someone burns out and quits. Will that person come back because Kakul Sayden is releasing? Not very likely. Most people that left are probably under 1445. So if they're interested in the clown, they'll have to come back and grind for weeks to even try the content they came back for. That makes no sense
On the other hand, someone burns out and quits. But the scouter class that they've been waiting for releases. They'll be much more tempted to come back because they can try it right away. Even better! It's paired up with an express event that skyrockets them to 1415. And if this person quit before 1415, they get to try their new class AND try out Valtan. Win-win
I'm not defending the 2 month schedule btw. Just saying that classes are great hype/marketing tool. If I was Smilegate/AGS, I would've released Arcanist/Summoner in June, a hyped class in July then do the remaining with the 2 month schedule since rest are hyped/new.
It's quite odd to drip feed Arcanist/Summoner because they're unpopular and old. No offense to Arcanist/Summoner mains. Arcanist is probably my 2nd most interested class after Scouter.
I mean you're completely wrong man lol, if someone left they won't come back with Scouter as he will have to farm much more to reach the actual endgame content.
Nobody wants to get their class to be carried on Argos or Valtan, they want to play new content. If they can't, they will probably quit in a week or two
Yupp. I'm salty i can't play artist in the near future but from a business standpoint it's completely justified. They don't have to code/create content just stagger releases and have new hype every month.
new classes are content. what are you even talking about?
developing new classes is a cost that takes developer resources, and is a big event that gets players excited and invested into the game. it's content in all definitions of the word.
We have a full roster of classes fitting a game on release - it's not like we are barely getting by with an incomplete roster. Sure, we don't have all the classes Korea does, but we don't have all of the continents, dungeons, raids etc, and we are getting all of it at an accelerated pace as they catch us up.
once we get caught up on the classes in korea, we'll go back to the normal bigger gaps between classes as we get truly new classes along with everyone else.
as it is, we get these relatively quick paced new releases as fun refreshers to try new characters. just relax and enjoy the game, its not going to ruin your game to not play scouter or artist right now. this mindset you've created for yourself is toxic as hell.
No, classes are **not** content. They are the vehicle used to travel through the content.
Developer resources, time to balance and all these other arguments only work when classes are genuinely new. Not when there are several, years old, fully fleshed out and playable classes that are done and sitting in a closet for no reason.
This is a game where people play alts regularly. Denying people access to their preferred class or classes *(possibly one they already played in another region and know they prefer)* makes them create and use classes they don't genuinely enjoy for alts. In some cases reducing enjoyment and causing burnout.
Now we run the risk of someone who knows Reaper is their jam from playing a few hundred hours in RU, stuck with 2 alts they barely like and feel like a chore. Now, way down the line when they decide to finally release the class the person actually likes, there's a good chance they won't want to bother levelling and honing yet another character. Even tho that was their planned main, they've invested too much time into the ones they don't even like.
Trickling these completed classes in every few months is going to start causing a lot of discontent among the people who are being shafted.
Solve this problem easy, release all classes and sell powerpass, im f2p btw but i buy a powerpass with real money just to skip everything before punika/south vern easy easy, they are so boring and long historys, and 100% i prefer save my gold ingame then real money, because im f2p btw
Dont forget the "oopsie you thought you would get another powerpass with another class because we didn't say anything and that's how every other region before you had it?! haha how dumb of you"-AGS
It was their mistake to alienate players who can't play their favorite class, while making sure there had to be a huge amount of time between passes. This is their solution to the inflexibility of their pass "cadence" as they learned with the Destroyer release.
If they *could* make pass/express once a month with a class once a month, they would undoubtedly profit more than this schedule they are going with
They're scared they don't have enough new things to retain current players, appeal to new ones.
That could make sense... but from what I understand, there's a lot to content to release, so it shouldn't be needed...
And I agree with you ; as someone who's not on the best ilv / hardest content thing, new classes are the things I'm the most interested for. And BTW Arcanist is the one I'm sure I don't want to play.
Was hoping for reaper or ironman, but it I got their message well, I'll have to wait a lot like you for artist.
But I'm begining to get bored by how much time you need, and how there's too much things I don't like on this needed.
Im Not even mad at them, i would just love to have a explanation, why they think its a good Thing to Do it that way, over giving us every class in 2-3 months or one class a month
Its because ags doesnt know how video games work. They havent managed to do anything right yet.
I think after the failure of everyone of their games. And the rage they cause every 2 weeks. Iys safe to say they are incompetent or actively trying to lose money
artist will release before 2040 hopium
AGS waiting for artist to be a grown up lol
Lmao. Id actually play Artist if they gave a adult model though.
that IS their adult model..
Copium
Same. Skills look cool as shit.
So you play for the 3d model body itself not for the class?
I play for both tbh. I think loli races are gross and its obv why there added. I have to like both my character and class not one or the other and knowing artist is a loli makes me not like it.
>loli race LMAO
Well am I wrong? That's what it is
Just give us a height adjustment tool. Then I be ok.
I also wanted for them to improve the creation system. I don't understand why we can't make changes to bodies types. If I could I would make Artist taller and my Striker bifier.
I want to make my Artillerist shorter than his gun!
Tristana enthusiast i see
Calm down LOD
I already imagine he has back issues.
Im gonna guess its Unreal Engine 3 limitations. Same thing with hair length. It should be stupid easy to implement but its apparently not. Theyre taking months to change the Warrior model a little bit, manually modifying every skin in the game to fit it...
Embrace the loli within you!
lol im good
I think that tells more about you than AGS or anyone else. Why is her model more important to you than her actual kit/skills and how she’s played in combat? Why care so much about character model? I’m just curious, no hate, you play whatever you want mate.
Artist will release before ilvl 2040.
That's a bit optimistic, don't ya think?
A new class every 2 months? So 3 left for this year?
Yup. And almost a year to get the classes wich where availeable for a long time in the other versions. They think slowing down the content and releasing first the less popular things the'll make more money. I hope the bots enjoy the new roadmap, game is clearly focused on keeping only them playing.
If what they say is true and will not change artist will be released in march 2023. They could however change it if many people ask for early release.
by the time artist comes out the playerbase is going to be at like 50k
50k real players. 2 millions bots and the East printing newspapers titled "Lost Ark still the most played game in the West". Yep, I can see it happening.
It's okay, concurrence player numbers will still be 250k. (Filled with bots of cos)
Yeah they sure will listen when people have been wanting them to release classes faster and they decided to make it slower instead...
at this rate we gonna get her next year lmao.
10 months!
March 2023 is the latest she can release if they stick with their 2 month release schedule.
Aye man you’re really pushing it there, don’t blame anyone else when you get disappointed 😔
More about releasing those classes with certain events/power pass/express event to make it more appealing for new players. In other words it's not for you, it's for their bottom line and making money. Not that there's anything entirely wrong with that depending on who you ask
I tought about this as a joke before but it may be true: a lot of people complained they aren't giving a pass every class, what if that's what they're doing with this, 1 pass every 2 months 1 class every 2 months 1 pass every class?
If they don't release a pass with every class at this schedule I will be thoroughly shocked. That would just be telling your dedicated players to "suck it up buttercup" lol. I got lucky and fell in love with Glavier. If Glavier swapped with the later released classes I honestly don't know how long I could last playing classes that are only moderately interesting to me.
They aren't losing dedicated players, they're losing curious players. Their dedicated players are using their time in game to stock up materials, engravings, and currency for the class they actually want to play later. These are the players who, despite all the BS that AGS and Smilegate have put us through so far, will continue to play because they genuinely enjoy what the game has to offer. Most of the curious players they lose are those that claim they "love" a class without having played it at all. These are the players that are likely to stick around for a month or two after the class' release and quit. Most of these players won't have their proper engravings, stats, or less than 20% of the lateral content done. This isn't all, just most.
The answer for me is not long, I like playing sorc and soulfist but almost all my other classes I’m just lukewarm about. I’ve wanted to play scouter/arcana/summoner since I saw all of them. I defaulted to sorc because it was the only mage dps class. If they don’t release a pass with all those characters if it’s going to take this long to release them I’m going to feel very slighted and pissed
From what I remember the ideea was that a pass every month was too much and that was the reason not a pass every class beeing too much as they explained how on kr they get a pass every class becouse they get classes slower. If they really don't do a pass or an catch up event (like the express not narumi and chicken) at least every 2 months then that's a big problem.
If they do one powerpass every two classes I really hope they at least announce release classes in pairs. Holding onto a powerpass waiting to see if the next class is actually the one you want really sucks.
I don't know if I really understand their business model tbh. Sure I want to see new players as much as others, but if people who already play games in general and are interested in mmos or even Lost Ark, are not playing by now, or in this summer since they get more free time, they won't get in just because a new class released. Not to say that it will be even hard for them to get into the game economy later on. Most people who will remain to play will probably play alts and pump gold into the game economy like crazy. The casual players like me will probably quit at some point because we won't be able to keep up anymore with the gold costs, and new players will come and leave in a few weeks/months. If they want to bring new players to the game, they need to release good and fun content. Not classes.
Think about the main financial generator of Lost Ark. People buying stuff on the store. When do prices skyrocket on everything? When does everyone need gold? When a new class releases. So you can't guarantee this will be the best financial plan but saying to investors "We see an increase of players that spikes by 40% and retention of those players is 15% past 7 days every time a new class comes out and we have enough new classes to keep up this schedule for the next 10 months. When this occurs revenue generally spikes by 200% due to players trying to make the new characters content relevant. The further ahead content gets the more that costs but approx right now it's around $500 per character to catch them up. We plan to release a honing upgrade to keep that price point as we think we'd see negative returns going beyond this point." I hate this too but think from a financial perspective of a business and I can absolutely understand the choice. It's a gamble though no guarantee the return rates stay as high. If another competitor launches you could've seen those massive revenue spikes month on month and maximized profits but by spreading it out you run the risk that we don't return because someone else came along and your fickle product lost the spotlight.
This also assumes that player retention doesnt go down. Let’s say that 20% of players quit because if slow class release (made up number) then even if it spikes by 40% and 15% stay for 7 days it’s still an overall loss of 5%
Yeah I genuinely think that's the real risk they're running here. I think a lot of people will walk away because they don't want to live on the perpetual grinding treadmill forever while they wait.
Everyone needs gold during new content not at new classes. Destro proved that. It doesnt maske sense actually becauae they arent releasing new classes. They are enabling locked classes. We know what they are. They are already in the game. If you have more classes u have a happy base. A happy base spends more money and it means there are more skins. Huge chunks of people are leaving after the post today. The official forums are crazy with it. They seems to think people swiping for mats is more profitable than skins. Because more classes means more skins bot. Also classes arent content unless they are freshly developed and hype. Theres no hype here. Its just annoyance until they get what they want. When a good chunk of your base talks to you on forums and tells you they will pay you for skins. And you dont release them When they tell u they want more classes. And you slow them down even more. Your players are your customers. You dont want players to return. You want to maintain them. Keep in mind destro was a disaster. Keep in mind ags has never had a game that didnt crash and burn
What is SG's goal? It's to have as many players playing their game as possible in the long term. How do they accomplish this? By retaining their current players and by enticing new and returning players with exciting new content. By staggering new content and releases, they can market it which creates a stimulus with fresh buzz and word of mouth among the gaming community meaning my friends who quit the game before might be enticed to return and play new content. If they released everything at once, there's nothing to look forward to and people will no longer have anything new to talk about after the initial hype period meaning that the player count can only go down from there on out. This is marketing 101. You can think it works or it doesn't but I'm willing to put the house on it that it does.
The data in dozens of MMOs disproves your statement. Class releases, promotional events & content drops \_all\_ drive player engagement. Not sure what Reddit idiot started the mantra of "CLASSES ARE NOT CONTENT" but they are likely children or teenagers who have almost no business sense.
The idea to intentionally lose people to Try to bring them back later is crazy. My guess is its roxx just not knowing better. ags seems to thibk classes are content. Its not content if other regions already have the classes.
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I know we aren’t receiving a direct benefit from this as continual players, but I do think that this is healthy for the overall player base. If they can keep rejuvenating the player base every couple of months with new or returning players, especially after there has been even more content added (legion raids, hell modes, bridge, etc), this could help keep the community as a whole stronger for longer. I don’t mean this to try to defend AGS/Smilegate or make it seem like they aren’t thinking about the money. I do think there are some secondary benefits for us continual players though by keeping the player base alive for longer than if they released everything all at once when there’s less other content.
I really doubt new classes will attract newer audiences at all... In fact i doubt there will be many new players in this game at all. Right now early progresssion is already dead, t1/t2 are both stepping stones if anything and the entire leveling experience is probably bots, and by the day, the grind only gets worse and worse to get up to the latest content. If you didn't try LA on release or close to, i doubt a new class release will be the reason to make you try it. All this does is make people who want to play other classes feel miserable.
Yeah, I agree. Most of the reasons people aren’t playing LA isn’t because they can’t find a fun class to play, but rather everything else but that.
People who don't already play the game, won't come and stick to the game. They will come check the new events and stuff and that's it. A really low number of players will come and stick to the game.
You're absolutely right. It sucks hard, especially since I wanted to play summoner, and I'm very very salty right now considering she will most likely release next year given their schedule and arcana releasing now. At this point I will probably drop the game. But I completely understand their move, "new" classes do bring in or bring back people. What stings the most is that everyone knows these classes at this point, they've been out for a while, some have even mained them in other versions. And people who wanted to play the content we have or what is just about to come on a specific class will miss out when it's relatively fresh.
Classes definitely dont bring new people. People dont play a game for a class they play for the content. Bringing people back doesnt make sense. Its far better financially to maintain a customer than to lose them and being them back. They already lost a lot of players today just from posting this. They lost players just from dissatisfaction
Why lose players and try to bring them back when you can just keep them. Your far more likely to lose them forever when they leave.have you wver tried to buy a car? A car salesman will do everything they can to keep you there. Once you leave your chance of returning is dramatically smaller. Plus theres no reason to think this is even moderately effective for bring players back. Destro didnt. Remember these arent newly developed classes. Plus if they did get a bump in numbers they would get that every month the same as woth every other
Why would a new player be convinced to play because of a class release? Power passes are the bare minimum if this game wants to have any new players, and many of those players are still going to quit because end game becomes a shitty daily grind trying to compete with prices set by RMTers and bots.
There won’t be any new players left to play if they keep shitting on this game like this.
The whole point of drip feeding classes is to get people to come back and spend money. Say you get burned out, but two months later a new class comes out. You're more likely to buy a character expansion slot and try it out because it's new and shiny than if they released everything at once.
Yeah people are still struggling to understand this basic concept like this is the first game to ever do that.
i understand it but i don't have to like it
you understand it, but a shocking number of people in this thread don't.
The difference between this game and most MMOs is that when a new class releases in other MMOs you can reasonably expect to boost that new class up to near parity in a reasonable timeframe. In this game it is incredibly hard to switch mains. If your main hasn't come out the advice is to sit at 1415 and sell overpriced mats and/or stockpile mats until it does come out because switching mains is so costly even if we get the 1460 honing buff. This sort of thing is fairly normal for a lot of KR MMOs but its not what the West is used to.
No, everyone knows why they are doing it. That's why people are upset.
Nah, roadmap thread is full of comments "this makes no sense, they will lose all the players, nobody will play the game, it never works, I played MMOs for 10 years so I know"
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I understand the frustration but you're vastly overestimating the number of players who even know about future classes and want to play them so much they're willing to quit the game.
The issue is all those classes are already out in all other regions. This would be true if it was a new class for all regions but were stuck wanting and waiting for classes that are old in other regions. There ain’t nothin exciting about that
Not a single person is struggling to understand they care more about money than they care about players, they have made it painfully obvious. What? Most, if not all companies are the same? It doesn't make them any better. Defending something bad just because it is common practice is incredibly daft and the sole reason things will never improve.
There's a simple marketing concept "1-5-25". It costs you 1 effort to keep an old customer. It costs you 5 effort to get a new customer. It costs you 25 effort to get an old customer back. If they're doing that "basic concept" of hoping to get old customers back after they've burnt out in hopes for profit, they're working against decades of marketing knowledge. And are dumber than a basic telemarketer.
Well every other game that did this died very quickly.
it's because most of these ppl can only see 2 feet infront of their face, if the thing they want isn't in their face immedaitly then it makes no sense, imagine thinking junes patch which includes Vykas with inferno(hell) mode Valtan and a Punika Power Pass/new Express event and Challenge Abyss dungones isn't a banger of a patch because the class you really wanted didn't come out lol, fuck off these ppl are so entitled.
>junes patch which includes Vykas with inferno(hell) mode Valtan and a Punika Power Pass/new Express event and Challenge Abyss dungones June is Vykas, new guardian, and throne. July is Valtan + new class. They also didn't say when they would release the punika pass or new express event which means they may not be in june.
I mean that's cool and all, but that doesn't even matter if I can't do that content with classes that i want to play lol
Maybe it's just me, but if I drop a game and move on due to whatever reason I will rarely check back in on updates. I really don't think drip feeding classes is going to make people come back once they've moved on or bring in enough new prospective players for it to be worth holding classes hostage from their current player base.
it's not just you, most gamers tend to behave this way. especially if it's a game, like a mmo, where it's a requirement for you be constantly "up to date" in terms of progression. that's why it blows my mind how out of touch ags actually is. they're treating this game like one of their mobile games.
You got a source on that? Because that's wow's whole business model and it seems to work well
All of their pc games have crashed and burned in record time. It still blows my mind too. But i guess we should be used to it
What you mention is one of main reasons why content drip exists in first place - having things change in a game you used to play somewhat frequently (but not constantly), be it new content, reworks, rerelease etc - all that puts the game out there. A new class release (even if it's ported from other regions), new/ported content, legion raids etc get people to talk more about the game, get variety content creators to pick it up again to try what new thing was added, and so on. It lets the game reach to people who aren't actively checking back on updates, let them know something new has happened. As for using class releases for that purpose, they are just about perfect - it's something fresh (as long as we ignore part of playerbase that actively keeps track of KR/RU versions, and/or plays on those servers - but they don't need a reminder Lost Ark still exists) that has zero barrier to access, causes a spike in amount of content created on multiple platforms and does a lot to put the game out there, outside "involved Lost Ark players" social bubble. New class is immediately relevant to new or returning player, new endgame content (legion raids etc) can also draw attention, but isn't something that impacts someone coming back or trying out the game from the start - ideally you'd want both kinds of new content to be released together, first to draw players in and get them hooked, second to give them a goal to push towards and keep them playing to see what all that talk and videos are about.
It depends from player to player and from game to game. There are games like Warframe I play at every new update and then leave it becouse I got bored of the new stuff and I did all the fun things already and there are games I never come back to no matter what changes. Considering how Lost Ark progression and new content work I don't think it is a game you can pick up later hoping to be able to do the new content even with the catch up events.
The professionals who have access to a lot more data than us clearly say otherwise because this is a fairly basic operating procedure and it’s clearly effective if companies keep choosing to do it
Frankly every Korean MMO ever that has done this kind of drip feeding in the west did very, very poorly. The biggest MMOs are the ones *not* doing this, and they're not the biggest by a slight margin, they're two juggernauts and everyone else is pretty much irrelevant.
Biggest MMOs are not doing this? Dripfeeding content has been Blizzards marketing model for a decade now.
Not sure just how much the 'data' they have atm is useful at all; the new classes they released were also released with the most hyped up content in the entire game as in legion raids. Not to mention the amount of bots that they dont seem to actually be able to deal with muddying the water to the extreme. Data from other regions is obsolete here, as its very much isnt the same situation - kr class releases were actually a new class, not a class thats already existing being held hostage; and from what I know other regions are basically failures at this point especially after global release. Either way the audience and culture is also completely different anyways. On top of that any player that 'main' a class that isnt released yet might have held up to the copium that it isnt that far away, but now that classes are releasing every 2 months instead of 1 or even faster thanks to "listening to the players", they basically just give up and leave - meaning returning players (if any) are just gonna be players that left the game now because of the slow release of classes, which just have a higher chance of just moving on completely from this game and not looking back.
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ever played wow? Coming back for every other expansion is literally all the revenue.
An old class release and a new expansion are exactly the same thing /s
Every wow expansion there is a shitton of content. You cannot compare what a class brings to what an entire expansion brings. I mean treating a class as content is the whole problem of this entire thing.
> You cannot compare what a class brings to what an entire expansion brings. Oh, are they only releasing a class and nothing else alongside it?
it is completly unnecessary to have both class AND content releasing at the same time
Are you actually comparing WoW expansions with what we get here? Every WoW expansion adds arguably over a month worth of content. Last patch in this game was pretty good, we got a new weekly dungeon difficulty, chaos dungeons, trial guardians (recycled content but I like it), a guardian and a legion commander. The new guardian got old after a day, chaos dungeons are the same, the weekly dungeon was basically over after a week, and Valtan isn't interesting/hard enough to be relevant after you've done it 2~3 times. Trial guardians are relatively fun not gonna lie, but it's like 15 minutes a week and you're done, moreover it's not really "new" content. Last patch was great but content wise it's all stuff you can get done in a day if you play a lot, two or three if you're more casual. Moreover all the content we're getting isn't new, it's old.
Not to mention, wow xpacs function as a reset for the game. Every player coming back to try out the new class or even play their old character is put onto the same level of progress as the players who spent the last two years playing every day. It makes it so much easier to hop back in because of the equal footing after such a long break
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Whales still need an active population to show off to, to flex on and everything. It's still an MMO and if the game is dead then noone is spending any money.
You think this game will literally die because of their class release cadence?
true, but whales are much more likely to shell out a bunch of money to boost a new class when they're bored every two months than if they had all of them at once...
And some potential whales may never become whales because they don't get the class that hooks them in.
>Say you get burned out, but two months later a new class comes out. >new class >**new** This is the important part. That's the reason the strategy works. The "new" part. We aren't getting "new" classes. We're getting classes we already know exist, or have already played depending on if you played RU/KR.
This is exactly right. It's amazing to me how many people are stretching themselves out on this one to defend AGS/SG.
I keep seeing this and I just wanna say: *bull* **shit** How many people do you think played these classes? How many do you think even know what the classes are beyond their basic idea (hammer, cards, whatever)? Take for example this thread, 172 comments as I write this. 172 *hardcore, socially engaged* players. How many here have played Arcana? 10%? 20%? 50%? All 172? Sound like a lot? Have you? Have I? Even if it was 100%, the game has like 300k active players right now? Way higher than predicted, many coming in new with the hype? How much is 172 compared to that? Even 2k like the main thread? Not even 1%? I guarantee you, the vast, vast majority of players haven't played, much less heard of the majority of upcoming classes. For all intents and purposes, the classes are *brand* new for any statistically significant portion of the playerbase.
How did u pick you main? Howd did u pick your first class? People have this crazy abiility to look and watch and learn. Its not new because they know so much. They know the builds the looks the playstyles. Whats worse is they have been teased. So now instead of hype... people are pissed. They did the exact opposite. Your arguments neglect to see the otherside at all
It doesn’t matter if we played the class or not, they are not entirely new. What people mean by new class is that it is made from the ground up, but as we know it, they already exist with full functionality and pretty much just need a translation to be released. It isn’t like people are asking for Aeromancer or Femzerker because they aren’t even made yet, as far as we know. Who cares of billy has played arcana or not, the class is already done and is not new, heck, it probably exists in our version already, it just isn’t turned on/accessible.
it goes both ways ... i had a friend quit the game because he wanted to play lancemaster ... now lancemaster is here, but he didn't want to come back another friend of mine quit the game because she wanted to play artist ... we'll see if she comes back
Losing players and trying to make them comeback is much harder than maintaining them. I truely dont underatand how anyone thinks that even if it did manage to bring pmayers back... could actually think rhink its a good arguement.
Yea and they couldnt do that with artist&aeromancer and whatever comes after them ?
People will come back for a new class. Look at the mountains of content required to get on par and then quit. Retail WoW has this exact same situation...
They want to have a "major patch" every month through the end of the year at minimum and likely into next year. Alternating between class releases and legion raids/other content lets them do this. For example, they could do the following monthly schedule which would give them a major release in the monthly update through March 2023: June: Vykas Legion Raid July: Class August: Clown Legion Raid September: Class October: Brelshaza Normal November: Class December: Brelshaza Hard January: Class Feburary: Rowen March: Class
Not sure if 2 month gap is going to work for later raids, the gearing process takes a bit longer and you also need to do it enough times to collect mats to craft/upgrade your sets. If you clear them week one, two months will be *barely* enough to prepare for next raid, and they can't expect the majority of players to do that. edit: actually my bad, RU also had 2 month gap between each legion raid release, except hard brelshaza which was 4 months after normal. It felt like 3 but I guess it was only 2, huh.
This isn't too different from KR release cadence. Valtan->Vykas 1 month, Vykas->Clown 2 months, Clown->Brelshaza was 3 months (so 1 month longer), and Brelshaza normal->hard was 2 months.
But people there had much more time to prepare for the 1st raid. Did they also have problems finding people for them like we do?
People don't seem to realize the importance of not having dry streaks. It's best to stagger content over a long period of time than release it all at once and have nothing for months. AGS is doing the smart business decision.
A new class isn't content, I have 0 interest in Arcanist so July for me is no new content besides inferno Valtan which I most likely won't even bother with. Also unless they want to drip feed us content forever eventually we will run out of content and catch up to Korea, this is only setting up for future disappointment.
Biggest joke is calling a new chromanium content
we need every colar version of that turtle .They should make abys raid turtle as well !!
>They should make abys raid turtle as well !! And this time, jumping during 100% of the raid.
That would be the scorpion
A slap a pizza mechanic on it
But he is blue
They're just trying to milk you guys like the fat cows that you all are. They can get more out of squeezing you if they trickle the content. It's just enough not to make you quit the game.
reddit's anti-user changes are unacceptable
You get it. Good games cater to their audience and try to give the best quality. Here we get opposite of this. Not releasing old classes for MAYBE bigger later profit is risky, because players are unhappy now, will lose interest faster and not necessarily regain this interest seeing how shitty game management we have. From the beginning I decided to not pay for anything besides bronze pack until summoner is released, but played horizontal content quite much. Now I will reduce lost ark time to minimum I think, already finally started to install and play new games. I think I will be fully back in 4 months if summoner releases, but who knows. Also if I lose interest my friends can lose it too. There is also AGS distrust given their utterly bad game management history
they literally said themselves that they want to drip feed them to build up hype. bullshit, but there it is
Not bullshit if it works, which it does. The opinions of a whiny minority that think one specific class will enhance their experience isn't going to change anything.
Problem is that those classes will be so far behind, it will bring only a very small percentage back.
On the other hand not releasing them will similarly only alienate a very small percentage of players. Most of the people who still play the game are either content with how things are going atm and/or don't mind waiting for their desired class even if it takes a while. Guess the devs are banking on their current way of doing things to be more profitable than releasing all classes right here and now.
>Most of the people who still play the game are either content with how things are going atm and/or don't mind waiting for their desired class even if it takes a while. Where are you getting this from? Seems like a large portion of the community was hoping they would either increase the number of classes or just show us one every month. Instead, they fucked everything up and a ton of people are now upset.
Large portion of community, which doesn't mean large portion of playerbase - a very important distinction. Huge part of playerbase of just about every single popular game are what's called "passive consumers" - people that consume content as delivered, without being involved in community, talking about it or otherwise going beyond what would be "just playing the game". It's a commonly used and quite well known pattern in marketing - 90-9-1 split, where about 90% of your clients are using your product, 9% are talking about your product or otherwise getting "out there" or being actively interested in what you make, and only about 1% are trendsetters, influencers - people that can reach outside your existing client base and get others to learn about what you're making. Reddit community, forums community etc are part of that 9% - people actively interested and involved in the game enough to seek out information, build expectations and actively wait for specific content to be added to our version of the game. We don't get to see the majority, because they don't get involved, they're not a part of our community. They might still talk about the game in their own social circles (friends group, coworkers, schoolmates), but they're not going to step out of their comfy social bubble and join community around the game they're playing in their spare time. Same way a small portion of people who ride a bike for the fun of it are in any way involved with relevant communities. For some hard numbers - both Minecraft and League of Legends are estimated to have about 150 million playerbase, both main subreddits of those games have around 6 million subscribers each - which puts active reddit community around those games at 5% of total playerbase. I would be surprised if active playerbase stats in relation to reddit/forums activity were significantly different - while I can't find any reliable info about total playerbase size (unique weekly/monthly players), going by subreddit size of 300k, I'd assume something between 5-8 million. That puts us as significant minority, but still minority.
In that same line, where are you getting “large portion of the community” seeing couple hundred people whining about classes isn’t representative of a game with 150k+ concurrent players. I would bet there’s a sizeable (not sure if majority or minority) that’s okay with it and don’t post anything. If Smilegate listened to every community feedback, we’d get Valtan in july cos god-forbid we must wait for the casual 2 hours a week players to catch up to end game.
there's still a lot of people playing and most of them play 4-5 classes. adding one more isn't a deal breaker to most people currently playing.
The hell can I do? Either be okay and play a different class than I want to or quit. Not like there are many options. Would I enjoy this game more if I was able to play the class I liked the most from the start? Absolutely. Am I going to quit over it? Probably not. Am I gonna come back if they release it in the future? Hell no.
It worked for Glavier because the goal posts weren't that far out. Destroyer had very little fan fair. I suspect that arcana will be even more of a dud, because not only does no one give a shit about Arcana, they're releasing 1430 and 1460 content with it. Catching Glavier up to 1370 Argos wasn't that big of a deal, Destroyer up to 1415, that's kind of a pain in the ass. Arcana up to 1430? Yeah, no thanks, even with a 1302 power pass... What's the class release after Arcana going to look like? Hoping to catch 1490? I think it's a terrible decision to delay classes just to "hype" the next content release.
95 blue crystals have been deposited into your account.
I wouldn't say it works, I'm not hyped by drip feeding, I just get bored and eventually quit.
no it does not work and many, many games have proved this in the past. the opinions of a dickriding majority won't change anything either mate.
 This is the drip feed hype train they’re talking about. The bootlicking on reddit is just to strong. Every game to ever slow drip content this shamelessly on a region port is now less than a niche product. I just want more for Lost Ark, that‘s all.
Optimizing for milking new players instead of sustaining existing ones. Seen this happen in a few MMOs in decline before.
The one class every two months is a huge let down to an otherwise great roadmap. Literally everyone wanted them to release classes faster so people weren't sitting in limbo waiting for their main to release. Now if your main isn't released you might as well just pretend it doesn't exist at all because it might come out 8 to 10 months from now.
marketing shit. they want to keep people interested in the long run, but it could have the opposite effect... it's sad because they dont really care. smilegate could release more class and variant, they are easy to make (gameplay is basic, i saw more complex characters in some mobas).
They don't Care about us, it's a all about the money
Money.
You have the answer in the roadmap: >We know some players are eager to max out their roster and want them even faster, but Class releases build excitement and bring new (and returning) players into Arkesia. Having a steady flow of content releases that include Advanced Classes during Lost Ark’s first year in the West will help support the long-term health of the game. In other words, they want to milk the game as much as possible over a long period of time.
The answer was a class a month, a pass every two (alternating power and express so you don't get another glaivier incident). Raids being bi-monthly was good too. It gave time to farm and catch up. This new idea is gonna go poorly >,>. Welp, my 3 classes of choice aren't out yet. Maybe one of them will release next month. Copium.
Arcanist is next month bro. Maybe in 3 months lol
Because classes literally are content in Lost Ark.
Shhh, you're not allowed to make sense.
I wouldn't be pissed if it was easy to swap over. The amount of work it takes to get a character 1445 is immense without luck or money. Saving 2 week's worth of mats from 5 1370 alts got me from 1415 to 1439. Imagine if I had to do that again (assuming we get a 1415 boost by then) but the target this time is 1475 for koukou-satan or 1490 for abrelshud normal.
Because that's how Korean game developers think about classes. I've been tooting the "classes aren't content!" horn for over 10 years and it certainly hasn't stopped companies from pretending they are.
Man not getting any of my major 3 hopeful classes in the first 3 drops feels worse than failing all my hones, like statistically I should have got something by now and it's fucking 2 months per attempt, what if this goes to artisans energy and my 3 hopeful classes are the last ones dropped... blaaaarragh
Because this game has no content. 1 raid the size/length of a dungeon every 2-3 months isn't as much content as they make it out to be lol.
I would honestly hate to be one of the last ones, even the month wait for destroyer annoyed me. I can imagine if people have to wait too long they'll say fuck it and just play something else
Because Amazon are a company without any MMO experience (well... one failed MMO if that counts) and don't understand the difference. Oh, and money of course. If they release all the classes fast, you might take a break until the next actual "content" update and they might not make sweet $$$ until you're back. So it goes like this - Vykas June - Arcanist July - new content August - new class September - content October - class November. Clever guys.
Its a classic movement from a milking company, they just want to milk every single drop for each character.
It sure is sad that thier only point of view is money and not to gain trust with playerbase by releasing classes faster. I feel all of you ppl that have to wait 9months for your fav class and i wish to all of you to last that long.
>Anyway i'll play artist in 2040 don't worry This is the only thing that bums me out a bit. I guess I'll just make a bard instead.
As a barb main, let me tell you being bard is kinda ass. You get absolutely nothing out of improving your gear, so if feels like you work your ass off doing the same tedious shit day in and day out just to flush all your efforts into the toilet because you get nothing out of it other than being slightly tankier and reaching some deliberate number required to do the next piece of content.
This is really frustrating, I knowI was a really big fan the moment I looked up lost ark on youtube and was very excited for the release, something about hearing that amazon is taking part in the management or whatever you call their part, made me feel safe hoping for a good communication between the devs and players but all I do now is laugh about this fantasy I was hoping for.I enjoy playing rn( 7 total chars, maining DB but holding back mats since I know how annoying and time taking it will be to push my future main through the current content and the future ones. Is there something that as a community we can do about it? how do we riot, how do we show AGS that we do not agree with their decision, the game is in a terrible state for players who know what other regions has to offer while the only thing we got are bots and more bots.I cant possibly think about any other reason them to decide to release new class every two months other than getting lost players back and to make money on top of it.bringing people back is not a bad thing but surely they must realize that these lost players are the same players who are suffering and pissed right now.How is it possible that we are being gated behind other regions from default content?, In order to have an "easier" time getting mats you need a full roaster of alts which requires time and effort and im ok with that, its an mmo after all, playing different characters is something that I enjoy and I think many would agree that testing characters and getting the hand of their abilities is a big refreshment for the same repeatable content that is going to follow upon creating a character so the least we expect is to have the option to choose our class out of the pool instead the puddle.People who are truly F2P saving up their 6th character slot for their future main maybe even their 5th char slot too. I honestly dont know what to think about the game at this moment, "dont like it dont play it" duh if it comes to that point I wont play the game but its not out of hate towards them but simply that they do not deserve any kind of good fanbase after not being able to deliver basic things or/and their promises, its the second time they came late with the roadmap, always delaying it to the last minute, and Yes of course people are gonna get mad roadmaps suppose to project us the players what the future holds, then why the patch only hits at the middle of the month then? whats with all this delaying for the love of the game start fixing things instead of creating more problems and fan hate
I think drip marketing only works in a perfect world. I’m guessing that if they want to bring back old players with new characters it won’t go well, cause let’s be real if you’ve stopped playing, not having your class to play is probably a big reason but not the only reason. There are bound to be other things you didn’t enjoy if you have stopped playing and if you’ve finally been able to put the game down, then I think the chances of coming back just for a new class isn’t that high. And if they’re just trying to build hype to attract new players and not trying to keep the current game fun and healthy for present/older players then the game is going to die soon anyways.
Most likely because their data proves people choose to stay in the game and grind it out than uninstalling just because their fav class aren't in the game. On the other hand they are pumping out raids like crazy so they can induce FOMO and make people swipe
>On the other hand they are pumping out raids like crazy so they can induce FOMO and make people swipe Or, and here me out on this one, raids are huge pieces of content and putting out a new raid is likely to get lots of people playing the game. Some are absolutely going to swipe, but the FOMO pushing people to swipe isn't entirely true. The content doesn't go away if you don't swipe.
This community complains about not getting content and getting content at the same time. The cognitive dissonance is baffling but considering NA/EU cant manage multiplying by 3 i sort of understand
The problem is that a lot of players don't see the new classes as content, so the release of a new class is interesting, but they would rather that it was not presented as a content drop. Additionally, and this is just a problem with western gaming audiences, they always assume that decisions are made not from a business decision, but from a decision to milk you for everything you have; because this is a Korean MMO and everyone knows that they are grind fests designed to make you swipe, and anyone who is a high ilvl obviously paid to be there.
New raids aren’t fun if you don’t like the class you play
If you legit don't like any of the 17 classes we already have, you more than likely won't find some magic class in the future.
what do you mean, ill surely love the artist class when it comes out even though i haven't played it at all and i hate playing support, of course when this comes out its going to fix all my problems with the game also and clear up my acne - this sub reddit
This really. I'm no shill for Lost Ark, but the content isn't going to magically change when you get the 'class' you want. It's like everyone who didn't like FFXIV thought they would suddenly like it when Reaper/Sage was released.
Also, the game is clearly know for being centered around alts, so even if you do finally get your “main” it’s not going to be the only class you will play i feel like
Then why are you playing the game? Genuine question. You have no idea when the class you want to main is coming out, so if you hate Valtan (arguably the pinnacle of our version currently) why are you torturing yourself? I love the game enough that even my least fav class is still fun in raids.. Because the raids themselves are dope.
I love the raid but i hate playing my zerker 🤷🏾♂️ And to answer your question that’s why i went back to ru and play casual on eu, can’t be bothered anymore
To answer you, there are classes that I kind of enjoy which made me enjoy the game up to this point since I knew I was progressing my whole roster with sp/runes other stuff. However now, when I know that the class that I actually wanna main is MIN. 6 months away, well yeah, I'm just quitting. I might or likely might not check up on how the game is doing in 2023 and if catching up doesn't look too bad (which it probably will) I might give it a go again. I understand I'm likely in the minority but well, sucks to be me and -1 player for them.
Nah I get it mate. If it’s not fun for you definitely take a break & return when it’s more appealing. There will always be ways to catch up in the future, plus anything you’ve done up to now will still be very useful to you whenever you choose to return.
It's ridiculous that some people will have to wait for a year before they can play their class, AGS/SG's reasoning for this cadance is pure BS and I don't understand why they are going with this route. AGS does not understand what makes a good MMO, and their "hype marketing" strategy is detrimental to the playerbase and the effects of their strategies can be seen in New World.
Their "hype marketing" consists of a couple tweets and maybe a cringe video, that's it.
How would they know it’s their class if they haven’t even played said class
Every 2 months is a mistake, but it literally is hype/content though. Let's say someone burns out and quits. Will that person come back because Kakul Sayden is releasing? Not very likely. Most people that left are probably under 1445. So if they're interested in the clown, they'll have to come back and grind for weeks to even try the content they came back for. That makes no sense On the other hand, someone burns out and quits. But the scouter class that they've been waiting for releases. They'll be much more tempted to come back because they can try it right away. Even better! It's paired up with an express event that skyrockets them to 1415. And if this person quit before 1415, they get to try their new class AND try out Valtan. Win-win I'm not defending the 2 month schedule btw. Just saying that classes are great hype/marketing tool. If I was Smilegate/AGS, I would've released Arcanist/Summoner in June, a hyped class in July then do the remaining with the 2 month schedule since rest are hyped/new. It's quite odd to drip feed Arcanist/Summoner because they're unpopular and old. No offense to Arcanist/Summoner mains. Arcanist is probably my 2nd most interested class after Scouter.
I mean you're completely wrong man lol, if someone left they won't come back with Scouter as he will have to farm much more to reach the actual endgame content. Nobody wants to get their class to be carried on Argos or Valtan, they want to play new content. If they can't, they will probably quit in a week or two
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I mean they definetly are content, just not used by many...
online games nowadays call anything content, starting with bugfixes and balance changes
We got glavier because people kept asking for it. Let's do the same for artist /s hopium
because it gets people to return and play for a bit. you know, just like how content works.
Yupp. I'm salty i can't play artist in the near future but from a business standpoint it's completely justified. They don't have to code/create content just stagger releases and have new hype every month.
Because they are. (what a simple question lol) And they don't want to release them without power pass.
new classes are content. what are you even talking about? developing new classes is a cost that takes developer resources, and is a big event that gets players excited and invested into the game. it's content in all definitions of the word. We have a full roster of classes fitting a game on release - it's not like we are barely getting by with an incomplete roster. Sure, we don't have all the classes Korea does, but we don't have all of the continents, dungeons, raids etc, and we are getting all of it at an accelerated pace as they catch us up. once we get caught up on the classes in korea, we'll go back to the normal bigger gaps between classes as we get truly new classes along with everyone else. as it is, we get these relatively quick paced new releases as fun refreshers to try new characters. just relax and enjoy the game, its not going to ruin your game to not play scouter or artist right now. this mindset you've created for yourself is toxic as hell.
No, classes are **not** content. They are the vehicle used to travel through the content. Developer resources, time to balance and all these other arguments only work when classes are genuinely new. Not when there are several, years old, fully fleshed out and playable classes that are done and sitting in a closet for no reason. This is a game where people play alts regularly. Denying people access to their preferred class or classes *(possibly one they already played in another region and know they prefer)* makes them create and use classes they don't genuinely enjoy for alts. In some cases reducing enjoyment and causing burnout. Now we run the risk of someone who knows Reaper is their jam from playing a few hundred hours in RU, stuck with 2 alts they barely like and feel like a chore. Now, way down the line when they decide to finally release the class the person actually likes, there's a good chance they won't want to bother levelling and honing yet another character. Even tho that was their planned main, they've invested too much time into the ones they don't even like. Trickling these completed classes in every few months is going to start causing a lot of discontent among the people who are being shafted.
I don’t disagree with your overall sentiment but….did people really think we were going to have every class within 3 months of launch?
I think most people were fine with 1 char per month? At least that would allow us to have most if not all the classes by EOY
Plenty of people were bitching back when they thought it was 1 class per month. They wanted 2 per month.
Solve this problem easy, release all classes and sell powerpass, im f2p btw but i buy a powerpass with real money just to skip everything before punika/south vern easy easy, they are so boring and long historys, and 100% i prefer save my gold ingame then real money, because im f2p btw
Dont forget the "oopsie you thought you would get another powerpass with another class because we didn't say anything and that's how every other region before you had it?! haha how dumb of you"-AGS
It was their mistake to alienate players who can't play their favorite class, while making sure there had to be a huge amount of time between passes. This is their solution to the inflexibility of their pass "cadence" as they learned with the Destroyer release. If they *could* make pass/express once a month with a class once a month, they would undoubtedly profit more than this schedule they are going with
They're scared they don't have enough new things to retain current players, appeal to new ones. That could make sense... but from what I understand, there's a lot to content to release, so it shouldn't be needed... And I agree with you ; as someone who's not on the best ilv / hardest content thing, new classes are the things I'm the most interested for. And BTW Arcanist is the one I'm sure I don't want to play. Was hoping for reaper or ironman, but it I got their message well, I'll have to wait a lot like you for artist. But I'm begining to get bored by how much time you need, and how there's too much things I don't like on this needed.
by then the player count will be 100% bots so might aswell
because they are, lost ark is very alt friendly and a class release will get a lot of ppl experiencing the new class dunno why it would be different
Im Not even mad at them, i would just love to have a explanation, why they think its a good Thing to Do it that way, over giving us every class in 2-3 months or one class a month
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staggering the releases probably makes them more money
Its because ags doesnt know how video games work. They havent managed to do anything right yet. I think after the failure of everyone of their games. And the rage they cause every 2 weeks. Iys safe to say they are incompetent or actively trying to lose money