Plato Denies eRep is Dead
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by Stlemmy
Hello everyone.
Haven't written in a while. More than a while.
I just wanted to share something with all of you.
Recently we had a chance to read an interesting article from Gnilraps name😛
Plato Admits eRep is dead.
I'm not going to repeat what he's saying, go read it you havent. But the article made international so i guess you read it already.
Anyways, the article is an opinion made by Gnil, which many of us have also, based on an interview of Alexis Bonte, the CEO of eRepublik labs.
I read the article and the interview and i had the urge to say something to Mr Bonte. And i did. I contacted him. I could have done it better but it was in the heat of the moment, as one would say.
Not to go on any further with the into, with a permission from Mr Bonte to share this I'm giving you a transcript of our emails.
My message:
http://i.imgur.com/JdGqI7A.png
Hello Mr Bonte
I am sending you a message just because i left a comment on your blog and it's not shown. Very sorry to disturb you, but i got emotional and i just wanted to send this to you no matter if you read it or not.
Reposting the comment:
Very sorry your game Tactical Heroes didn't achieve the succes you wanted. I have never tried it because i have no apple device and i don't like mobile games.
On the ther hand, when you can take a look at this article regarding yours: https://www.erepublik.com/en/article/plato-admits-erep-is-dead-2587147/1 and see how the players of eRepublik feel about this.
We're the one's who pay in eRepublik and generating profit for eRepublik Labs which can then be invested in different things. We're the ones who made Tactical Heroes possible. But eRepublik is dying. The number of players is declining every day. And the fault is on the game and it's developers/admins. It's not a problem to pay for a good thing, but paying with no cause is a ilussion with a limit. People who are still around, are just playing for themselves, saving gold and hoping better days will come.
eRepublik is your miliking cow, if you don't see to it you'll have no more milk. Please think about it, i would hate to see eRepublik dead but if nothing changes it will slowly come to that. Talk to the comunnity, see our desires and problems. Let's make eRepublik a game with more than 10years of ACTIVE playing. Let's make it great again.
And his reply:
EDIT: damn pics look small so i copied the text
http://s30.postimg.cc/3trgtnbtd/Screenshot_2.png
http://s15.postimg.cc/m4vk9rdjf/Screenshot_3.png
Hi Antonio
Tks for reaching out and sharing the link of the in-game article, I read it with interest as well as the comments.
All the comments on my blog need to be manually approved before they go live. That is to avoid spam, trolling or incorrect information being published. Comments will be reviewed this week and the ones that are fiar and balanced published.
First of all allow me to say that I am saddened that the person writing the in-game article chooses not to mention one important fact. That yes we failed with Tactical Heroes but we succeeded with Age of Lords. So now we are in a situation as a company where we have 2 successful profitable games instead of one. Why commit this fact?
At no time during the past years where we opened development on other games did we stop maintaining and investing in eRepulik.com.
We may have been conservative in the updates we bring to the game but that is simply because as we all know its a very delicate and unique game with a difficult balance and big changes are risky and could break the balance (as its happened before). So when eRepublik.com is your only game it is difficult to take risks. Now that we have a second successful game with Age of Lords, we can be more ambitious in the changes we will make to eRepublik.com and take a bit more risks.
So I can stay that it is completely false to say that we are not fully committed to the success of eRepublik.com. Thanks to the Age of Lords positive impact on our finances, we actually have recently increased the development team that is dedicated to eRepubik.com.
Right now eRepublik.com's main flaw is that it doesn't keep enough of its new players, we know we have been advertising online to get new players in the game. This is a problem that like any problem has a solution but its not an easy one and we are working on how to solve it (and this includes checking what the community says and getting feedback from several different players)
Now that we have learned both from our failures (Tactical Heroes) and our successes (Age of Lords) we are in a much better position to make improvement to eRepublik.com that can have more positive impact on the quality of the game for both new and old players and yes make it a game that celebrates its 10th year and it is growing again.
We see a longterm future for eRepublik.com the browser game but also the concept and the brand and it is at the center of our strategy to grow it alongside other concepts and brands such as Age of Lords. We think that if as a company we are able to run 3 or 4 successful game brands rather than just one, then all the games will benefit from that.
Thank you again for being a devoted player Antonio and I hope the above answers at least in part some of your questions and goes some way in explaining and demonstrating that as a company and personally we are very much devoted to not only continuing to maintain eRepublik.com but growing it as well.
Alexis
Ps: There are also a lot of very good comments in the article, one for example mentions how its important for us to give devellopers the possibility to work on different games (something that gives them fresh a new ideas and keeps them engaged, learning new technologies that eRepublik.com can benefit from), the others mention the importance as a company not to put all your eggs in just one basket. All of these are correct and sensible points.
Ps2: Feel free to share my reply in game (but please share 100% of it 🙂
So what do you think? Are they fully commited? Will the game become better? Do you think Mr Bonte understands what are our problems here? Be sure to comment.
That's all folks.
P.S. I sent a reply, a really long one, with examples of things that aren't good. I think i might have overdid it. If he answers i'll be writing a new article.
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Foxes will revive the game 😃
image links are broken
if you read this Alex : We need a good mobile APP for erep, not this mobile version sh*t!
Antonio, vruće mi je
Talks like a politician.. An politicians always say the truth... 😃
that's exactly the impression I got.
Sve piše u slikama koje se ne vide o:
Kad zaigra drmeš lagani... 😉
oce srceeeeeee puknut u meniiii
he s full of you know what. look at his interview with clopo. his main problem was in game interaction within players. so he introduced genius novelty - MU chat. probably most annoying thing ever invented in history of egames.
he s hiding behind bad decisions and only draining € from ppl that are still here not caring on inflow of new players that can only keep game alive
i wrote this more some 5 y ago. it entered top 5 international back then. some things are really basic, but he ignored them and they are reason why thousands of users left game and there were no new ones (not counting BOT's) to replace them
https://www.erepublik.com/en/article/small-changes-that-can-improve-erepublik-eng-hr--1946499/1/20
I am saddened that Alexis is pointing out the balance in the game as major blocker for development - and, as a long term player, I do not see where the balance hides.
Also, he was sincere and confessed that most of their effort went into bringing new people in game, sadly but this proves the premise - the game development is frozen.
how to beleave someone who never respect paying players just scam them with sutpid changes full of bugs--... sold his customers for some Bitcoins that he present it as an gift xD
it's just a big ----> loool
Nice article.
I guess the best solution to keep all the players in game would be divisions by streight and/or military rank.
It would make much more sense and entertainment for each player.
He admits that they know the main flaw of eRep, big difference of new and old players and that they scared of taking risks
And that is sad and epic fail
You lost thousands of players and what did you do?
Nothing
I think he actually read my comment in that article.. 😃
why? got fp? 😛
No.. 😃
But I got 1 in january for a boob pick.. 😃
Next step could be investing in other than military modules of the game. For instance in this topic in erep forums is a nice one.
problem? Players killing the game. Killing with multies, with acc trade, etc . :/
also killing with negativity, you're not "cool" in the eUS unless you cry THE GAME IS DYING over an over
agreed. I think mastercards are killing the game.
no game = no money
Actually looking at this game's current stance account trade is the one thing that still keeps it alive.
"We may have been conservative in the updates we bring to the game"
lol
whats so conservative about keeping features in the beta stage :3 thats not conservative that is just sloppy
who cares? it makes no different for u. They could remove the "beta sign" and then? You wouldnt be happier
true I would complain about the lacking functionality of said feature without using the word beta or rather I'd complain that they merely removed the word beta without changing anything
Right now eRepublik.com's main flaw is that it doesn't keep enough of its new players"
why?
you join the battle with 5 str against TITAN*** over 120K str
stop the IK and change the level up for XP+Str
A polite answer from Bonte, as always, but no concrete things or improvements, also as always.
There are lots of things which can be improved in this game. Alexis at least give some hope they will still work on develope it. If you listen to most long time players they have given up on the game already.
This is a long time marathon web browsing game. The path to success is not guerilla war or fancy graphics.
If the game shall attract new players and make them stay the community must be core again. When we started back in 2007-2009 we did not build on our own players first and most, no, we build countries. We organized thousands of players into working countries.
People came for the game but stayed for the community. Sadly admin killed the communites and turned the game in to single-player mode. Into a one-man-army game.
We need the countries back, we need hospitals back, we need so much but most imporant - thank you Alex - you gave a tiny little bit of hope back.
Working country it means also different currency which vary in relation to military power. For me, there on monetary markets was like on Dow Jones market and the real fun in this game... sometimes...
erepublik is dying like every living organism, lived well did his job for a long time and its time to close the doors.
its sad to admit that games are comercial playgrounds, when its dead must do what to do.
at least he answers and allow to share.
thank you for this article
I like his attitude.
Keep rocking, and try to turn the game around. I hope you make it.
@could break the balance
WHAT BALANCE?
eRep Labs would be conservative as long as there is a cashflow from current whales until replacing whiners with newcomers (aka making whales less powerful) make financially more sense which is not much likely.
eRep also has 8 years of metal fatigue and burden of past, some of them are irreversible anyway.
i liked
thank
Committed? Barely.
During the last year very little things have been done to eRep and old standing bugs have been ignored just as before. Being afraid not to ruin the balance is a terrible excuse for not fixing many well known problems. They simply ignored eRepublik for quite a long time, with only minimal touches here and there so people can't say that literally nothing has been done. There were months when they didn't even check the elections voters. That alone says a lot about their involvement. They admit the new user retention. We all know old players quit the game every now and then.
This all means the user base gets smaller. At one point, it will become irreversible. But they prefer treating the subject in a political manner. Sure, the reply is understandable. But the fact that the game has seen almost no progress in a long time says more than anything about their commitment. Facts, not words.
A glorious and simple change they could make near immediately would be to allow scripts again, especially MM'rs.
That would change communicating with the masses of newfriends and more from tedious and awful to easy and rewarding. It might not bring the game back to it's halcyon day...But it'd be a start.
Because no one else scripts...
Bruh.
Uses*
Well sure, but many are dissuaded b/c they are afraid of the Man, man.
Thank you for sharing this with us. Interesting exchange.
I still love this game and believe it has legs.
I have not read Gnilraps' article yet because, as a general rule, it's better to not.
also
I'll leave this right here.
https://youtu.be/sqyiUNGcTrY
courage, you going straight to him like that.
balls, his reply being so pandering and slick.
For sure he cannot say they never develop erepublik anymore.
Next: Plato denies water is wet, sky is blue, pope is Catholic.
rearanjarea diviziilor pe baza fortei militare sunt singura solutie care ii poate determina pe cei noi intrati sa ramana mai mult in joc
It's also hard to work with so many different personalities.When V2 military module was introduce 90% were b*tching and crying and now it is praised as the best ever.We are saying that the economy is dead but what will we do if they remove Work as Manager? 90% will say they will quit the game, that they have been ripped off,etc.
It's hard to make decisions to satisfy anyone.In order to keep new players you need to give them a positive discrimination against existing players, thus angering the existing players who are the ones playing.
There are solutions, for one I would gladly give up on Work as Manager just to restore some logic into the economy,but they need to have courage to do it.
There is a pretty easy solution to encourage new players to stay longer without making the rest of the players worse off.
They just need to create a noob division. A division where you stay for 6 months no matter how hard you fight, work and train. After it, the experience is reset and put to the normal D1. This would bring them the possibility to make money and have fun with the military module.
But being realistic, is just giving them a taste of what they could do in the "real" game. People came for the game but stay for the community, but you need a certain amount of time to interact with the community, if you are kicked out by the game the second week, there is no "decoy" to stay longer. With this you have more possibilities to create a "sentimental attachement" to the game and the people in it and they will probably enjoy it even after they are shit in the battlefield again.
Apart from it, it would probably boost the economy, as it is giving new consumers with almost no capacity to produce, boosting the demand function and almost not changing the offer side.
This won't solve the game and all the problems it has, but I see it as an easy way to retain more new players, which in my opinion, is one of the biggests problems the game is facing at the moment.
We don't need noob division
just stop the IK and request XP+str for level up
ex: D1
unlock next division with 50K str + level 35
you can stay in D1 with level 900 if you want stop training
or you can stay in D1 with 150K str if you not level up