Funcom AO is getting mind numbing and what are you going to do about it? I hope you are not waiting for Shadowlands to bring you out of your slump. I started playing AO in November and since April I have seen AO steadily spiral down hill. AO is a wonderful game but with many issues. Some of those issues are complex and some of the problems could be easily remedied. I took a break from the game for three weeks and came back and created another character. (The main reason that I play AO is due to the character size. I don’t like playing a game where the character are the size of a quarter on my monitor.) My new character is only level 40 and I can honestly say that there are fewer people playing the game now then ever. I have spent days at a time looking for a team with little success. Every once in awhile, just by good luck, I would fine a full team and then its back to standing around yelling for a team to group with, but only having to give up and soloing a mission. (and no I’m not one of those players that team just to get a team mission to solo). Maybe Funcom will fix that issue.
I asked an ARK representative where all the new players were? He told me that probably they were on vacation and that Funcom sales are in better shape then ever. Hmm! The polls reports families this summer are staying home this year or traveling a hundred miles from home, only to be back at the end of the day. Hotel occupancy is down and airline ticket sales are low. Funcom had to restructure their organization and let personnel go. Funcom is even asking their clientele base to find players for them. The days of having 59 or 100 petitions ahead of you are no more, (zero, 8 or 20 is the norm). Are these indications that maybe something is wrong with AO?
I remember the days when we hunted for experience and did missions for items and credits. Plus, there were many groups of people standing outside the west gate of Newland, standing at various OP-s outside Tir for the purpose of forming teams to go hunting. Those days of seeing 3 to 4 teams hunting shades are gone, 4 to 5 teams hunting in Rhinoman cockpit are gone, people standing in line waiting to group at bully bridge are gone, and countless teams in Mort are no more. Remember the days when you were new to the game and you had a mission out in the boondocks and on your way to the mission you would always see another player coming and going. Just to stop and talk to them was a special moment in the game. The ARK told me that players are doing team missions now days. Well! Ok! they still have to stand around looking to join a team to do those team missions. Where are those players I ask? I have stood many hours by Fare Trade which is the chosen location now for low level clans to find a team. For higher levels its North West terminals in Tir. I don’t see many high levels standing there anymore. Maybe they started ALTS, but then why don’t I see them by Fare Trade? Has the game come to players creating MA-s to run solo missions? Not many people get to play 8 to 10 hours a day at this game.
Here is a suggestion: Remember the ARK department responsible for events? Or did Funcom do away with that department? That department is responsible for “producing, and starring in small, medium and large events”, so why don’t we see much for this? Where are those Dust Brigade terrorists? Are they in nursing homes now? It sure would be nice to let us know this, or are we suppose to wait for them to pop up in their walkers. Do you want to create excitement and mayhem? Staging an event can liven up the game so much if you would take just 30 minute to one hour a week. The terrorsit doesnt have to be in a team, if anything have a renegade terrorist. This doesn’t have to be done in the cities, where a lot of the other events took place only to have the servers crash. It can be done in the wilderness. I would love to encounter the Dust Bridge while running through Varmint Woods and then getting on OOC chat and telling the whole world of Rubi-ka that the DB are having a picnic in the woods and lets gank them. It doesn’t take a lot of computer programming and organizing to just run around killing people. Plus, players like to see their names posted as participants or casualties of an event. I remember way back when you had other events and of course the servers crashed, but hell we had so much fun and ended up talking about it for a few days afterwards. Take the most wanted article, that was a hoot. However, you forgot the little man. Just don’t recognize the higher players who may have ARK characters and whose main playing character gets reconized. Characters that are level 20ish and 70ish would like to see screen shots of their bodies lying in some field or city recognizing them as being a casualty. Which would be Rubi-ka Times or Voice of Freedoms responsibility to stimulate the players lust for gossip, dirt, envy, or sorrow. I wish and hope that maybe you will actually listen to someone that didn’t post a letter to bad mouth another player or whine about not having something that another profession possesses.