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I've said it before...Increasing New Player Interest.
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Malakye Appleton
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#1 - 2016-08-24 16:18:06 UTC  |  Edited by: Malakye Appleton
I see a lot of new posts regarding the decrease in the Eve playerbase. While some of it may be well true, the changes in the way accounts are handled etc tell me its not as bad as many make it appear to be.

However, I too would like to see the player base increase and while Eve is constantly addding, taking away and changing the game, in order to truly capture the interest of new players in todays market, you have to INSPIRE THEM and EDUCATE THEM.

This isn't the beginnings of a new game where being left to figure things out on your own is fun and worthwhile like it may have been back in the day. Too much has changed over the years and too many players have grown tired of educating others (not all of course but many).

When a new player logs into EVE, while they are told to run career missions to earn initial isk and learn all of the basics, they are essentially thrown into the PVE end of the kiddy pool with no real direction from there. Those that care begin looking for information online. What they find are a slew of out dated tutorials and how to guides of which contain information on aspects of the game that have either changed or simply no longer exist. This information, being as outdated as most of it is then leads the new player to believe that the game is dead and or dying because the player base no longer support its with relevant guides anymore. So many articles Ive found on topics of personal interest were as old as 2010 or 2011, that being the latest information on a topic available.

CCP should highly consider investing some money into buying up as many of the outdated blogs that come up in search engines on all of the various elements of EVE and updating not only the older guides published on those blogs (which will immediately show up in Google as being updated or published TODAY as opposed to 5 years ago), but also add to these blogs with the latest updates and guides.

The fact is, so many of these blogs and posts are so old and they continue to get so much traffic that Google thinks its all still relevant and helpful. The authority of these blogs are high due to age, traffic, low bounce, backlinks, etc which means its going to be much more difficult for new tutorials and guides to out rank them.

Even if someone were to contact the original blog authors and get them on a list and these bloggers were paid in ISK or PLEX to update their old guides with new and updated information, I'm sure many would and if they wouldn't, I'm sure many would be willing to at least provide access to their blogs to CCP to keep updated. Give these bloggers a rare Journalist ship that gets them in and out of tight situations or something.

While there is a lot to be addressed in EVE, I know that my original account was started in 2004 and it wasn't until 8 months ago that I finally began taking the game seriously. What got me interested once and for all was finding a Wingspan article about Exploration that was pretty new and very informative. That lead me to other aspects of EVE and on grew my overall interest.

CCP, I would gladly help in this effort if there weren't anyone on CCP staff with the knowledge and or experience in such dealings. I'm sure others would be willing to help as well. While updating the game itself on an on going basis is obviously a major effort, the information found by potential players online has to be updated as well or only your current player base will ever know all of the things happening in EVE.

This really should be a focused effort with systems in place to ensure new and updated guides and game information is being published and aggregated properly. I promise, if this were done and done well, you would see your player base grow again.

Living the dream, one tear at a time...
Soel Reit
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#2 - 2016-08-24 16:22:54 UTC  |  Edited by: Soel Reit
bla bla bla...
ccp should update old blogs...
bla bla bla...


wait a moment... they shutted down the wiki... to keep updating 2000 blogs?
that's f***ing smart.

really next level. i love your idea.
+1
Solecist Project
#3 - 2016-08-24 16:23:52 UTC  |  Edited by: Solecist Project
And another one who prays to big brother.
Good intentions, yet so far off the mark.

OP ... first you need to understand that educating them isn't the problem.
I actually wrote a post about this explaining it easy enough for most to understand.
(that wasn't meant as insult)

That ringing in your ears you're experiencing right now is the last gasping breathe of a dying inner ear as it got thoroughly PULVERISED by the point roaring over your head at supersonic speeds. - Tippia
Memphis Baas
#4 - 2016-08-24 16:34:58 UTC  |  Edited by: Memphis Baas
CCP has done studies, and there are plenty of additional studies on the internet that show that what attracts new people is shiny new graphics or new features. And by contrast, improved tech support, better documentation of features, etc., don't do much to attract new players; a game is expected to have whatever tech support and documentation is considered "standard" for the genre, because having less will result in bad reviews and turn people away, but having more than the standard doesn't do much.

And, as indicated above, beyond the basic tutorials to show you the interface and rudimentary ship movement, it's not CCP's job to train you. It's not Blizzard's job to train you how to properly organize a raid to take down a dragon, how to work around its flame breath and special attacks, how to divide the loot, etc. Similarly, here, it's not CCP's job to train you how to properly use each ship, how not to get killed, how to make money in a competitive PVP environment, and so on.

Finally, you're ignoring tons of excellent guides that are maintained by players out there. And it's not CCP's job to point you to them, though they try. Most of them are linked from the Newbie Questions forum, and you can also google them or ask other players.

EDIT: Oh yeah, and it was CCP's idea to remove the tutorial and replace it with the Opportunities screen, because, according to them, the tutorial's many pages of information were too boring and people quit the game because of it. So, sometimes we come up with a theory based on appearances or from a personal point of view, and when they do a study and collect actual data, it shows the opposite.
Artayick Nantes
Center for Advanced Studies
Gallente Federation
#5 - 2016-08-24 16:42:27 UTC
Memphis Baas wrote:
CCP has done studies, and there are plenty of additional studies on the internet that show that what attracts new people is shiny new graphics or new features. And by contrast, improved tech support, better documentation of features, etc., don't do much to attract new players; a game is expected to have whatever tech support and documentation is considered "standard" for the genre, because having less will result in bad reviews and turn people away, but having more than the standard doesn't do much.

And, as indicated above, beyond the basic tutorials to show you the interface and rudimentary ship movement, it's not CCP's job to train you. It's not Blizzard's job to train you how to properly organize a raid to take down a dragon, how to work around its flame breath and special attacks, how to divide the loot, etc. Similarly, here, it's not CCP's job to train you how to properly use each ship, how not to get killed, how to make money in a competitive PVP environment, and so on.

Finally, you're ignoring tons of excellent guides that are maintained by players out there. And it's not CCP's job to point you to them, though they try. Most of them are linked from the Newbie Questions forum, and you can also google them or ask other players.



You do know that blizzard has guides built in for every single instance don't you? Tells you about the trash, the abilities they have.. tells you about each boss... and what to expect from them based on the class you play. This includes dungeons, raids and world bosses. That isn't the best example of "not educating" the masses. They also have LFR ( looking for raid) which is a low end version to let people get started with.

I think that exposing people to all the dangers early on could help. Explaining everything in the game would take to much effort.. but force them to get ganked.. making them mine is the worst possible low sec zone and either teach them to fight back or educate them on how to avoid those people. Getting blown up sucks but having it down to a civ fit venture isn't as bad as them thinking they are safe and losing an exhumer one day and rage quiting.
Solecist Project
#6 - 2016-08-24 16:44:31 UTC
Can't find it, maybe I haven't posted it yet.
Well, it's not needed, tbh

Teaching new players "better" does not help retention rate.
Tens of thousands of people manage to learn the game.
Those who don't manage that will not manage the game either.

People need tl be smart enough to limit the time frame of their searches ...
... so outdated information is no excuse.


And now the important part:

The goal is to raise retention, nothing else.
Everything else, including learning, is secondary.
Anyone who finds it too hard to learn or research ...
... will not want to play this game anyway, because it's complex and demands research.

And the big one:
Once a new player subs his account, the learning/teaching is already fully covered.

"But Sol! SOL! HOW DO YOU KNOW??? YOU CAN NOT KNOW THIS!!"

99.99% of all players playing this game learnt how to play this game after they subscribed.
It's easily observable by looking at the lack of idiots who ask stupid questions about the most basic stuff.

Understanding the game mechanics doesn't make people sub. They have a lot of time for that after the fact.
What makes people sub is excitement, adrenaline, curiosity. Adventure.

The 0.01% are dropouts. The low abilitied ones. I love this, I'll keep this term.
My name really justifies literally (ha!) every possible fun i have with language. ^_^

That ringing in your ears you're experiencing right now is the last gasping breathe of a dying inner ear as it got thoroughly PULVERISED by the point roaring over your head at supersonic speeds. - Tippia
Solecist Project
#7 - 2016-08-24 16:48:09 UTC
Memphis Baas wrote:
CCP has done studies, and there are plenty of additional studies on the internet that show that what attracts new people is shiny new graphics or new features. And by contrast, improved tech support, better documentation of features, etc., don't do much to attract new players; a game is expected to have whatever tech support and documentation is considered "standard" for the genre, because having less will result in bad reviews and turn people away, but having more than the standard doesn't do much.

it's funny how all these studies might help ...
... yet are completely worthless when it comes to EVEs core new player issues.

Not trying to dismiss your post at all.
It's more a "theory < reality" thing, where the reality of EVE demands certain measures not possibly covered by theoretical studies of numbers unrelated to the game. I do sometimes wonder if CCP fell into the "professionality-trap" ...

That ringing in your ears you're experiencing right now is the last gasping breathe of a dying inner ear as it got thoroughly PULVERISED by the point roaring over your head at supersonic speeds. - Tippia
Malakye Appleton
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#8 - 2016-08-24 16:48:35 UTC
Memphis Baas wrote:
CCP has done studies, and there are plenty of additional studies on the internet that show that what attracts new people is shiny new graphics or new features. And by contrast, improved tech support, better documentation of features, etc., don't do much to attract new players; a game is expected to have whatever tech support and documentation is considered "standard" for the genre, because having less will result in bad reviews and turn people away, but having more than the standard doesn't do much.

And, as indicated above, beyond the basic tutorials to show you the interface and rudimentary ship movement, it's not CCP's job to train you. It's not Blizzard's job to train you how to properly organize a raid to take down a dragon, how to work around its flame breath and special attacks, how to divide the loot, etc. Similarly, here, it's not CCP's job to train you how to properly use each ship, how not to get killed, how to make money in a competitive PVP environment, and so on.

Finally, you're ignoring tons of excellent guides that are maintained by players out there. And it's not CCP's job to point you to them, though they try. Most of them are linked from the Newbie Questions forum, and you can also google them or ask other players.

EDIT: Oh yeah, and it was CCP's idea to remove the tutorial and replace it with the Opportunities screen, because, according to them, the tutorial's many pages of information were too boring and people quit the game because of it. So, sometimes we come up with a theory based on appearances or from a personal point of view, and when they do a study and collect actual data, it shows the opposite.


This isn't WOW or other simpletons MMORPG where flashy graphics and cool story are all that matter. This is a very complex game that has as many facets as a diamond, each one very a very complex system. Setup PI to build mainframes without a guide explaining how. Setup a booster lab with no guide. Do anything in Eve that isn't running a mission or mining a rock without a guide and see how lost you become. Tech support and other things are great, but this isn't like any other MMORPG and therefore the metrics of other games shouldn't be used as the end all be all to know how to further grow it.

It's not CCP's job to train you, but again, unlike many other MMORPG's that have hit the market that rise and fall in a matter of a few years, EVE has a tried and true player base in a world that has continued to grow and expand its offerings while making many changes to old opportunities and as such has a slew of old and outdated information that give EVE the appearance of a dead game nobody cares about anymore. Perception is reality. This isn't about training new players to play as much as keeping the perception of EVE as being one of constantly updated with a thriving playerbase that care about educating new players.

And Im not at all ignorinig the updated guides full of great information, I referenced one in my OP. You aren't getting the point.

Living the dream, one tear at a time...
Mysa
EVIL PLANKTON
#9 - 2016-08-24 16:51:49 UTC
Now days all kids want to spend their "hard" earnd cash to victory, buying content in form as ship skins, injectors and plex to sell for isk to fly that one awsome ship to go shoot thingies whit. Then theres that one day they all realise eve actually takes alot of effort to win, ccp have lost them to to next six month period of other up comming game to throw cash at.
Eve is supposed to be hard, its not a game for everyone. And ccp dont want everyone!

SoloFoLife! -KEKE the Merlin wonder
Soel Reit
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#10 - 2016-08-24 16:54:29 UTC
in particular: it's not for kids this game.

so... i should biomass myself FeelsBadMan
Aen Clarke
MAYHEM BOYZ
#11 - 2016-08-24 18:19:18 UTC
The thing with EVE is that its not for everyone.
And i think we need to accept this because somehow we all have stayed for a reason - We like to be here. And that's all there is to it in the end.

I have played for a while - taken brakes then and then. (Other character) And i'm always surprised how money players there are online all the time. Its always from 15 k to 25 k. Some day this week it was around 32 k. And it is still kinda the same number when i started around 4 ago. (In my opinion and from what i remember).

But sure, i've read that newplayers have a hard time, hell i did too. But it was worth it, because i had fun - same as many others, but for some there was no fun in it. And they went.

Cheers.
Beta Maoye
#12 - 2016-08-24 18:21:50 UTC
Why not offering players PLEXs, injectors or skins for maintaining an updated EVE wiki? The wiki will be on best-effort basis and CCP will not guarantee its accuracy. CCP just provides incentive for updating the wiki. Many veteran players are good writers. Some has been doing this even for free. Some will be happy to do this for some ingame items reward. Cost is low. Centralized update information in details will be very useful for new players.
Solecist Project
#13 - 2016-08-24 18:46:45 UTC
Ah I get it!?

It's not about guides, it's about reach?
Like, paying bloggers as advertisers for the game?

That ringing in your ears you're experiencing right now is the last gasping breathe of a dying inner ear as it got thoroughly PULVERISED by the point roaring over your head at supersonic speeds. - Tippia
Jenn aSide
Worthless Carebears
The Initiative.
#14 - 2016-08-24 18:57:53 UTC
The OP said "I've said it before". We know, we've heard it. it's wrong. I've said the following before as well:

Tutorials , hand-holding and too much information are bad things for sandbox style games. While people like the OP do of course mean well, they get it wrong to the point where is CCP does what these people think they should do, they'd end up with a game that loses players even faster.

From the linked article:
Quote:
This all reminded me about another psychology experiment I learned about from Jonah Lehrer’s recent book, Imagine: How Creativity Works. In a 2011 paper impressively entitled “The Double-Edged Sword of Pedagogy: Instruction Limits Spontaneous Exploration and Discovery” Elizabeth Bonawitz and her colleagues set out to examine how different modes of instruction affect how creative people get in their exploration of a new system.
--Snip--
What the researchers found was that relative to those in other conditions, children who were given instructions on how to make the toy squeak played with it for shorter amounts of time, did fewer unique actions with it, and discovered fewer of the toy’s other functions.


Tutorials lock players into a "this is how you do that" mindset that locks them out of the joy of discovering new ways. This is what the old EVE tutorial circa 2008/9 or thereabouts did, it funneled people into mining and mission running, loads of people thought "this is how you play EVE" and as soon as the content got boring for them (very quickly), they left.

The OP doesn't realize it, but he's actually advocating for CCP to repeat this mistake again. The best thing CCP could do IMO is go back to the old way of "here is a space ship, now go **** yourself". Well, ok, maybe though them a skill injector or skill training accelerator or two, but that should be as far as that goes.
Galaxy Mule
Galaxy Farm Carebear Repurposing
#15 - 2016-08-24 19:26:16 UTC
Back in my day we got 5,000 ISK and an Ibis-

-AND WE LIKED IT!
Paranoid Loyd
#16 - 2016-08-24 20:05:01 UTC
Solecist Project wrote:
Can't find it, maybe I haven't posted it yet.

LolLolLol

"There is only one authority in this game, and that my friend is violence. The supreme authority upon which all other authority is derived." ISD Max Trix

Fix the Prospect!
Solecist Project
#17 - 2016-08-24 20:22:22 UTC
Paranoid Loyd wrote:
Solecist Project wrote:
Can't find it, maybe I haven't posted it yet.

LolLolLol

I wish i could like this a thousand times! :D

That ringing in your ears you're experiencing right now is the last gasping breathe of a dying inner ear as it got thoroughly PULVERISED by the point roaring over your head at supersonic speeds. - Tippia
Malakye Appleton
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#18 - 2016-08-24 21:08:42 UTC
Jenn aSide wrote:
The OP said "I've said it before". We know, we've heard it. it's wrong. I've said the following before as well:

Tutorials , hand-holding and too much information are bad things for sandbox style games. While people like the OP do of course mean well, they get it wrong to the point where is CCP does what these people think they should do, they'd end up with a game that loses players even faster.

From the linked article:
Quote:
This all reminded me about another psychology experiment I learned about from Jonah Lehrer’s recent book, Imagine: How Creativity Works. In a 2011 paper impressively entitled “The Double-Edged Sword of Pedagogy: Instruction Limits Spontaneous Exploration and Discovery” Elizabeth Bonawitz and her colleagues set out to examine how different modes of instruction affect how creative people get in their exploration of a new system.
--Snip--
What the researchers found was that relative to those in other conditions, children who were given instructions on how to make the toy squeak played with it for shorter amounts of time, did fewer unique actions with it, and discovered fewer of the toy’s other functions.


Tutorials lock players into a "this is how you do that" mindset that locks them out of the joy of discovering new ways. This is what the old EVE tutorial circa 2008/9 or thereabouts did, it funneled people into mining and mission running, loads of people thought "this is how you play EVE" and as soon as the content got boring for them (very quickly), they left.

The OP doesn't realize it, but he's actually advocating for CCP to repeat this mistake again. The best thing CCP could do IMO is go back to the old way of "here is a space ship, now go **** yourself". Well, ok, maybe though them a skill injector or skill training accelerator or two, but that should be as far as that goes.




No, no, no.

I'm looking at this whole thing from a marketing perspective. Most of you are looking too deep into it. I have read justt about everything I could, watched every video etc and learned a great deal about EVE and enough to get me hooked in. However, none of that compares to what I've learned already in my short time in VMG. Real world experience, tactics, fitting, how ships work together, hunting etc that I've never seen a guide for. The reality is, tutorials will only teach people the stuff that other people are willing to have others know. To get the "real deal", you'll have to play and align yourself to corps with the knowledge. Its just like real world Freemasonry of which I am a member. You can read a ton of stuff online, but if you want to learn the real deal, you have to learn from the inside.

To put it all very simply, EVE needs helpful content all over the web with current dates so that people with an interest in the game or casually Googling eve see this instead of 5 or 8 year old content. We dont want people to think the game is dead and no longer supported. Its that simple.

Living the dream, one tear at a time...
Teckos Pech
Hogyoku
Goonswarm Federation
#19 - 2016-08-24 21:09:43 UTC
Galaxy Mule wrote:
Back in my day we got 5,000 ISK and an Ibis-

-AND WE LIKED IT!


Ibis?

Velator you Caldari squid.

"The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design."--Friedrich August von Hayek

8 Golden Rules for EVE Online
Teckos Pech
Hogyoku
Goonswarm Federation
#20 - 2016-08-24 21:11:03 UTC
Malakye Appleton wrote:
Jenn aSide wrote:
The OP said "I've said it before". We know, we've heard it. it's wrong. I've said the following before as well:

Tutorials , hand-holding and too much information are bad things for sandbox style games. While people like the OP do of course mean well, they get it wrong to the point where is CCP does what these people think they should do, they'd end up with a game that loses players even faster.

From the linked article:
Quote:
This all reminded me about another psychology experiment I learned about from Jonah Lehrer’s recent book, Imagine: How Creativity Works. In a 2011 paper impressively entitled “The Double-Edged Sword of Pedagogy: Instruction Limits Spontaneous Exploration and Discovery” Elizabeth Bonawitz and her colleagues set out to examine how different modes of instruction affect how creative people get in their exploration of a new system.
--Snip--
What the researchers found was that relative to those in other conditions, children who were given instructions on how to make the toy squeak played with it for shorter amounts of time, did fewer unique actions with it, and discovered fewer of the toy’s other functions.


Tutorials lock players into a "this is how you do that" mindset that locks them out of the joy of discovering new ways. This is what the old EVE tutorial circa 2008/9 or thereabouts did, it funneled people into mining and mission running, loads of people thought "this is how you play EVE" and as soon as the content got boring for them (very quickly), they left.

The OP doesn't realize it, but he's actually advocating for CCP to repeat this mistake again. The best thing CCP could do IMO is go back to the old way of "here is a space ship, now go **** yourself". Well, ok, maybe though them a skill injector or skill training accelerator or two, but that should be as far as that goes.




No, no, no.

I'm looking at this whole thing from a marketing perspective. Most of you are looking too deep into it. I have read justt about everything I could, watched every video etc and learned a great deal about EVE and enough to get me hooked in. However, none of that compares to what I've learned already in my short time in VMG. Real world experience, tactics, fitting, how ships work together, hunting etc that I've never seen a guide for. The reality is, tutorials will only teach people the stuff that other people are willing to have others know. To get the "real deal", you'll have to play and align yourself to corps with the knowledge. Its just like real world Freemasonry of which I am a member. You can read a ton of stuff online, but if you want to learn the real deal, you have to learn from the inside.

To put it all very simply, EVE needs helpful content all over the web with current dates so that people with an interest in the game or casually Googling eve see this instead of 5 or 8 year old content. We dont want people to think the game is dead and no longer supported. Its that simple.


As always, be very careful generalizing from an unrepresentative sample, generalizing from personal experience and the like.

"The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design."--Friedrich August von Hayek

8 Golden Rules for EVE Online
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