Way to skip over the other question there.
Also, you’re using the term gaslighting incorrectly. That’s a fact.
But have fun with PoE 2, a game that isn’t technically even alive yet!
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You keep saying “by definition” but I gave you three definitions, with sources, that contradict your definition. Did you make up this definition? Do you have some insider knowledge with Miriam-Webster and they told you what the definition was? Where’s your source for your definition of “dead game”? Cause right now you’re operating off of the “because I said so” logic, which isn’t “facts” it’s your opinion.
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Actually it wouldn’t. The game would be flourishing.
Not true. I know you forum warriors like to argue unimportant semantics because there is nothing to do right now because LE is dead. I get it.
Look this is the first time I checked the forum in a few months hoping for some good news and sadly there isn’t. I’ll check back in a few month hoping EHG saves LE and it’s worth playing again.
I just don’t get why you can’t acknowledge clear obvious problems so they can be fixed? It’s like you don’t want LE to succeed. Which is a shame. If you love LE then you should want for it to not be dead and have an active player base again some day.
With that I wish you guys luck and most importantly EHG luck in saving LE. Until then there are other games to play while waiting. LE is a great game but it lost 99% of the players and EHG needs to revive this game to bring them back. I hope they do because I’d love to play LE again and invest time in it again.
Umm, sir, your direct quote about your “definition” of a dead game is:
And I’m no mathematician, but 50% drop off is a significant drop off. So by your definition, 500k players when the all time high was 1mil, is a dead game.
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It’s not that is a standard drop in players. Everyone knows this. Anyways I’ve highlighed enough above. See you guys in a few months if EHG can fix this mess.
As a LE fan I’m rooting for EHG and you should too. Hope LE can be saved.
OK, let’s say it’s a 90% drop off, that’s still 100,000 players. So, is that a dead game now? 99% drop off would leave 10,000 players. Is that dead? Your definition is flawed, buddy
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We can, but we don’t call the game dead (or is it dying? still no answer to that) just because it isn’t perfect the way we want it to be.
I’m also confused as to why you say you love the game, but you don’t want to play it unless it has X active players. Are you incapable of enjoying a game without feeling you’re part of the crowd? If so, congratulations on being the first person I’ve met in my entire life that likes being part of the sheeple!
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That would be so tragic, I just don’t understand how I would manage to carry on with my life if he blocked me 
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That had me lost too.
Id love to see far more people playing LE than the 2k or so currently playing. Imo if they say they love the game player numbers shouldnt even matter to them.
Hell iv been playing LE the last week. These sneak peaks for season 2 got me itching for loot again. Meh 2k players big whoop im still having fun.
Heck i sti play it lurks below from time to time that game has less than 1k playing.
Never understood gamers that cant play what they enjoy but instead need numbers to tell them what a good game is to them.
Imo seems u would miss out on so many great games basing it on numbers and not ur own enjoyment
I’ll summarize your post shortly:
First of all, 1k is a very bad state. Not utterly ‘dead’ but at the brink of it, they have the ability to ‘revive’ still. Given massive changes in perception and pace happen.
For the other values: 5k off-cycle is fine and ‘alive’ easily. The initial playerbase at 1.0 was massive hype, 70k is a healthy amount of returning players. That part you’ve simply depicted wrongly.
But overall the core of your argument that LE is in a bad state is very true.
Yeah, Urban Dictionary was always a mess and also is in that case.
A ‘dead game’ first of all can only be a online-game since it has no meaning for single-player at all.
That comes from the part that either the multiplayer aspects (grouping) or the market related aspects suffer from it.
In case of a live-service game it becomes ‘dead’ when realistically the income won’t support the company anymore, which in this exact moment is definitely the case and unsure of it changes in April.
Your second source is better and showcases that LE is in a ‘very very bad state’ as it only has a 50% buffer of playerbase… and hasn’t received any significant updates in the last 6 months (An event is solely a filler, not a proper update. And the loot lizards are a joke content-wise, in no way ‘significant’ to warrant saying ‘it’s been updated!’. Otherwise to avoid this state a dev only needs to change a single mob and it would be fine too…)
As for the third one: Yes, LE has very few players hence by that aspect it can be considered ‘dead’ again.
A) Is not the case. They’re severaly ‘inactive’ for a live-service game. This is not a ‘classic’ MP title and also not a SP title.
B) That also happens with 10 concurrent players in a game, it has no meaning. Obviously 1k will produce more words, we’re talking about a 100 people company though, it’s not sufficient.
C) ‘All my friends stopped playing’ is this exact complaint you’re searching for and can be found in a surprisingly large amount in the forums for people telling about their gripes. That’s the exact thing you’re looking for.
1k players is not a healthy playerbase for a 100 man sized company. That’s a ridiculous notion.
That’s not metric to go by. A game can be ‘healthy’ and stagnating as well. It’s a nonsensical notion to only depict growth as a measure of success, extremely limiting.
Also your argument about ‘high vs. low points’ is in no way a statistical outside in LE, so that’s also a bad way to create a proper reasoning. By your definition Path of Exile is a dead game, which obviously is a laughable notion.
Also the game never had a 300k concurrent playerbase.
Which is a bad metric. You go from the overall engagement of players. Which would mean ~5k players for the game to be doing ‘decent’ off-cycle. We’re at 20% of the viable amount though.
A fully dead game is shut down.
A dieing game is when there’s distinct signs of engagement lacking (3+ months of low playercount for example) which we have right now. The usual way it goes is that the next ‘substantial’ update then decides between the ultimate success and failure of the product. Which we’ll see in April hence. But there’s a significant chance (I would say >25%) that the playercount doesn’t recover to a degree that long-term development of LE with their company size is sustainable.
This then leads to a reduction of the studio, reduction in pacing for the updates (even worse would be a guaranteed death-sentence after 1.2) and hence slow-paced bleeding of money until it can’t be sustained anymore.
In gaming terminology this doesn’t hold true. A SP game can never be ‘dead’, only Online games can. And 1 person doesn’t create a social environment, hence by definition ‘dead’.
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Ah, but you see: Abomb is the type of player that only cares about the numbers. He’s the type of player (just check his history) that says that if a build can’t stomp 1k+ corruption, then it doesn’t exist.
LE currently only has 2-3 builds he can play because all others are pure trash (his words).
So if he only plays the meta builds, why wouldn’t he only play a meta game?
Abandonware would like to disagree 
If a game can’t be bought anywhere and, in many cases, can’t even be run on a modern computer without an emulator, then it’s effectively dead, even if it’s single player.
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They offer a true-offline experience that caters to players who don’t want to experience the economy/online aspects, and unlike Wolcen where it was shifted to a true-offline experience because the game died, it’s more like Chronicon in that it was originally designed as an offline experience (except LE added online multiplayer later). Edit: and regarding the “severely inactive”, they’ve communicated exactly why they’re “inactive.” as the kids say “let them cook.” We’re currently in a situation where the devs launched an event and said “hey guys, it’s going to be 4 to 6 months to the next patch, but it’s going to be our largest yet.” and players naturally said “ok, we’ll go play something else. Let us know when you’re done.” which doesn’t mean the game is “dying”, “dead”, or “in a bad state.” it means the devs are between major patches.
It can happen with 10 players, but isn’t very likely. Global chat would work but they’d struggle to run the economy and they’d have to want to party together to experience groups. This is far more likely to happen with 1k players, and the situation of “the markets stagnant” or “no one wants to group up” is very rarely going to happen amongst 1k players than amongst 10.
All of my friends stopped playing. If I joined a game with 800,000,000 active playerswith my group of 3 friends and I’m the only one still playing it out of our friend group I can easily say “all my friends stopped playing.” does that make the game dead?
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It was never designed as an offline experience, it was built as an offline experience to get people playing & giving feedback. It was always intended as a mixed offline/online game.
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Yeah, that’s why abandonware is not called ‘dead’ but ‘abandoned’.
Also old games are not ‘abandonware’ but simply… old games. Abandonware commonly was depicted as developers leaving a unfinished product and doing nothing to fix it up properly.
Which was never meant to be the core aspect of LE, the core aspect of LE was always meant to be the live-service bit. That’s already talked about here.
Take that into consideration.
And even if that wouldn’t be the case EHG creating a live-service segment demands treating the business model in a live-service fashion. Which is simply not properly done at the current time and date.
The only upside is when the live-service part is actually dead that the true offline experience will stay functional, which is a major major plus in my book.
True, but we’re nonetheless seeing it at 1k players in LE. The market is currently very very stagnant, especially since there’s a split between players in cycle and legacy players, which reduces the active amount of people for each economic environment.
No, but it’s a deciding factor for group-based players in a rather substantial part. If from your group of 10 people which are hack’n’slash lovers only you and maybe a second one stays mildly interested as the game isn’t providing a long-term environment to enjoy then that’s a definite downside to the social environment and stability of the game.
Which currently is a problem for LE.
It’s not a decider, it’s a indicator.
You’re correct, that’s what I was trying to imply. The game was built offline first with the intent of adding multiplayer later.
You missed the part where I said:
The game isn’t dead or dying, it’s in between major patches so players aren’t as interested in continuing to play once they’ve accomplished their goals. I’m in that boat right now. I love LE but don’t have the motivation to start a new character right now because I’m waiting for the next patch and the changes it will bring.
Yes, and if the time for updates with a live-service game becomes too large then the amount of interested individual becomes smaller. Also the time needed for a substantial amount of players to be active - and buying stuff - needs to be respectively higher.
This indicates how ‘alive’ a game in a live-service environment is as the chance for them to gradually ‘bleed money’ is respectively higher the longer the cadence of updates is. Which is why you see most live-services games ‘dismantling’ themselves over time by alienating their playersbase. To stay profitable and functional you need to churn out content, good or bad… you need to provide a constant ‘fresh’ experience to keep players engaged and paying to cover costs and make a profit.
You’re completely disregarding the aspect of developer communication.
If EHG went 6-8 months with radio silence, no information on the next patch, if/when it’s coming, etc. Then I’d completely agree with you. But they’ve literally announced that the next major patch would be delayed to fit in stuff they planned for 1.3 but moved up to patch 1.2 because of player feedback. This pushed 1.2 back further than it would have been normally.
This situation has been entirely communicated by the devs and understood by the players. It’s not a situation of EHG disappearing and not providing content for 4+ months for no reason
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Abandonware is simply a game that isn’t sold anymore and to which there is no more support. That’s all. The vast majority of old games fall into this category. They are, for all intents and purposes, dead.
Even in single player a game can be dead or not. If a game is still played (like Grim Dawn. Yes, it has an online component, but is mainly a SP game), then it’s not dead and the devs can still work on it and release patches and even DLCs or expansions. Even remakes.
If a SP game still has support from the devs, either in the form of patches or in the form or techical assitance, then it’s not dead. If it still has a relelvant community playing it, then it’s not dead.
Which is why you can say that a game like Bioshock Remastered isn’t dead (still has support and over 500 daily players), but a game like The Secret of Monkey Island is dead.
You know it’s bad when I can’t be arsed to argue a thing & think that said argument is kinda pointless…
Just saying.
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