Since everybody on the forums is so salty and bashes FC pretty much every second post, I'd like to offer the below:
So I have returned to the game about a month ago after a break of almost 3,5 years. When I quit there were not many people in the game. There still isnt many, but it is not fewer than it was before. Different people but similar amount of population. I didnt expect many when I returned, I didnt really care, just wanted to play the game even solo. And guess what I'm actually having a good time.
Yes, I have encountered the MB stack. Yes I've been gangbanged by agents on BS many times. Yes there has been power creep. Yes, I had to do inf missions again. Yet I still have a good time.
And I am actually pretty dazzled by the amount of new content. POH is a yet another interesting encounter, the new ICC looks great, the NPE looks and plays great too. The profession rebalance brought some interesting changes. Froobs and paid players alike got a new playfield (The Reck). Levelling is not painful anymore in AO. There is very few grind left in the game. And all these were done by a really small dev team.
Behold people, believe it or not, many of the biggest complaints/wishes have actually been addressed:
- /assist in pvp was removed
- froobs got decent weapon choices (revamped -000 weapons, Reck weapons)
- MANY ways to level
- Profession balance in PVM is much better than before
- A LOT of cred sinks in the game. Prices have been normalized, although "recent events" also affected this
I know new problems have arisen, but that's exactly what I said like 4-5 years ago: the playerbase will never be satisfied
I'd like to take the opportunity to thank the dev team the effort they put in keeping the game alive this far, and hopefully much beyond. I know I know, they get salaries for this, but I am fairly sure that the team is doing this partly for passion.
As lip service-like as this thread might seem, it is not, as I have nothing to gain writing this all down. I just wanted to point out that the effort is appreciated and despite the flaws that many here love to point out pretty much every opportunity they get, the dev team is doing a decent job.