I am well aware but you are talking a small number at the moment.
The largest problem is content. And people taking a break.
(Taking a break isnt bad)
Just referred to it because the thin player count. And the fast content isnt moving as fast as needed in a game like this.
And here is the issue. I think everyone is right. There are players leaving because of unpleasant inter-actions with other players. There are players leaving(or taking a break) due to a lack of content. There are players leaving as they feel the game is too time consuming.
So where does that leave the developers?
It is an oversimplification I know, but there is your three tent poles to keep players playing.
And yes, some people will always say it is too hard or grindy…
That’s what I would call a nightmare.
For them, I think the best course of action is to push out as much content as possible and fill the game with as much to do as possible. Throw in balance here and there with those content patches with some included quality of life stuff. If that means these patches get released once every 2 or 3 months, so be it. Cause the current way they’re doing things isn’t working and they need to pivot.
I also think there needs to be in game moderators that are separate from the devs that can respond better to reports and give the needed appearance that things are being looked at without the need for reports.
everybody wanna build nearest to the biggest hub on day one
when town grows people quit and new players get pushed to outskirts off town far from portals
towns mostly designed to small and to middle focused
to solve this im gonna look today to make a town network
so new players have new terrain and easy access to portal hub
i see so many hubs that all lead to same place
basically copy’s off each other running a micro network off double portals (also guilty 
)
think bossplayers can improve alot off towns by building town networks from zone to zone
leading noobs to virgin ground with stable portal link
etc etc
we all need to improve and adapt
dont be afraid to grab hammer and delete stuff and redesign
keeps ya busy improves your town
if we are talking about long term player retention then yea there is for sure a problem there too…hell just look at the portal seekers discord most of the people there that used to log 6 or so hours into the game only really play now to maintenance the network…my self i only ever log into do the hunts if it was not for that i prob would never log in at all.
my self i find that i subjective term it kind of depends on your definition form a development stand point the game is live and well…form a playerbase standpoint if you compare it to other MMO’s it flatlined about 3 months ago 130 players average (pc) compared to say FF online witch is at around 8,513 given they are 2 totaly different games but if we where to cheat and say minecraft servers count has a MMO shard the top servers on there are clocking in at around 200 average (pc)
Edit: re reading FF online was a bit of a bad example cuz it has been out way way longer and is a established IP
i think it was the launch thread they know this was going to happen cuz they did not drop any ad rev into it cuz at the time if they did a legit launch it would have been sim city all over agian with no one able to log in due to full servers and crash’s…hell im not 100% sure even now the servers could handle 500+ people in one data center
nvm it was just a little befor launch
saldy i think this is going to hurt the game long term AWS was not ment for what they are doing when i took the student course’s they made it overly clear the service was built with web services in mind not a video game with 100+ consists connections to database’s
If that was the case then they wouldn’t have felt pressured/forced to release as early as they did. When they released the PS4 version, at least, was plagued with so many issues.
They say they expect it to be a slow burner to downplay the realistic expectations. They can’t afford to have it have massive growth at once because their infrastructure currently cannot handle it, or at least it couldn’t previously. They haven’t really commented much on any, if any, strides towards progress on that front.
On the other side of that sword they need either constant growth or at the very least influx of new players to offset the players leaving so that they can continue to get a) funding from the playerbase and b) funding from the outside.
Boundless is currently in that shaky ground area where it either course corrects or sinks more. As great as the game seems to be and as great as this small community can be, none of that matters if the population continues to degrade as a whole.
As to the OP, just watch the stats daily at Boundless.ninja
Updated: 2019-02-19T09:40:02-0800
Page auto-refreshed every five minutes.
Total of 228 players across 48 planets
People comment that it’s normal for a games population to degrade over time and that’s true but on average during prime time it’s sitting around 280 if I recall? Someone more nit picky may have a more accurate stat there. Whether it’s normal or not is not the question or point to ask. Can Wonderstruck and Boundless continue in a positive cash flow direction with the current population, that is the question.
im willing to bet my power coils it was not them that forced it tho it was the $#@! at square enix that did has soon as they got there grubby hands on it alot of things started to change involving the release
edit: sorry for going a bit off topic
And I would bet that same bet with you, sadly it doesn’t change the current scenario the developers and gamers find themselves in.
I’m certainly not an expert about the whole architecture and backend of the game. If I remember right there is a lot of local database design with a manager type component and stuff.
I think they have optimized things decently but certainly some decisions put them in a corner and they are working hard to get out of that corner.
It was communicated at release that it was rush a bit more than expected. They could not release at end of year because Sony wouldn’t allow it with other games coming and instead wanted it sooner to drive into the holidays with growth.
James stated the slow burner comment because from the perspective of the developers, nothing changed in the overall direction - continue to grown the game. The only thing that was different was that it was release and not early access any longer. So they continue to focus on doing things as quickly as can to meet the demands needed.
Yea, that’s why I stated what I did. Not everyone saw those comments or dug back in post history enough to see/know that. It’s what gives insight in to where the game is now, with the dev size they have, and what is realistic to expect from them in a timely fashion.
To be honest had I known those comments before I stumbled across the game during the PS4 release I wouldn’t have purchased the game at that time. I would likely have waited another year because by and large the game is in an early access phase right now, whether it’s called that or not.
They kinda shot themselves in the foot with a few of their patches early on.
When they removed bomb mining, sure maybe 3 people cheered but the unanimous voice was, “BOOO!”
And then they randomly added wax to the decorative block recipe a few days later and once again, “BOOO!” … One person cheered though because there’s gonna be that guy in every crowd.
They’ve been considerably more cautious after that, and the recent footfall patches have left people scratching their heads more than anything. But with the exception of the guild and chat update, none of these updates have brought much fun to the game… sure, new blocks are neat-o, but I hear they’re a pain to produce in large quantities. And mass producing snowmen was just downright unrealistic.
Games like this need cool/fun things to do in addition to building. That’s gonna be when the player base really starts to grow. I will say though, I’m having a blast building with ice right now… dirt cheap, easy to get, looks good, doesn’t require machines or days to produce, doesn’t require off the wall crafting ingredients… just mine some ice and build!
It’s more like this game is at its plateau this is the representation of the game that we all enjoy or we wouldn’t be here now on the forums. We preach the issues and we give suggestions ideas we tell the developers and everyone involved in the community what we want to see come to this game but that’s as far as it ever goes. I’m going to give my opinion and people can dislike it or like it but the bottom line for me is I LOVE this game and I will stick it out till the next great thing comes around but I need more information on where this game is going. We are getting farming that is great but aside from a picture that says farming we are being fed nothing about it and all we have is player speculation. How are we suppose to know if this game is going to give us something worth staying for another few months if we are given next to nothing but words example: hey everyone farming is coming to the game us well that’s so vague we dnt care and some of us won’t stay to find out. Vs hey guys farming is coming to the game here are some pictures of what to sort of expect plus look at this developer hard at work making a whatever for the update - now I’m drawn in now I’m like yea I’m going to stick it out for a few months while I wait for that next big update. Same thing goes for all these players ideas why is there not a way to support fan made content make the dev workshop for people to make content for the game and select the best ones based on the voice of the people. Not only all of that but a Q&A session where we can ask questions about the game and upcoming patches.
Yeah the game absolutely needed to release when it did. Bounless was never meant to compete with holiday heavyweights and falls more into beloved indie territory, only with a 10x larger dev team. 6 more months wouldn’t really have made that much of a difference, and I’d rather be playing the game while they finish it than waiting for some distant release date. Each time the launch date for a game gets pushed back the expectations go up… to the point that eventually these expectations can’t be met.
Q&A sessions takes developer time. There is only so much of that. So many of us prefer them coding and finalizing a release beyond general forum posting.
I would say if you have questions do a post with them and see what information you get back… But without listing them how can we know if we get the responses we want.
I dnt see any issue with them spending 1 hour a week answering questions and sharing information.
they dnt have to be in the office to answer questions about their game.
At some level we do see them doing that. Luca just responded to a thread. We have vdragon doing stuff… James posts, etc.
The challenge with Q&A is we have a very common pattern that there is always someone in the community that does not like the answers they hear. This has been proven over and over.
We have seen James answer questions and get yelled at… now not answering questions is bad.
Ask the questions… There are people that have some knowledge of what is coming and maybe can answer them for you… or a developer might.
Have you seen my metro network on Finata at Ultima Mall? Check it out 
I don’t agree sorry
Showing future content is NOT something they are doing very well.
Timelines are vague and very sketchy at best and the next content was going to be Farming.
Simply creating a pretty image and a vague ’ don’t expect carrots ’ is not keeping the player base. For me personally farming was going to be the content that might keep me playing longer but it’s all a bit too little too late really.
Game arrived 6 months ago and so far - zero new content except new planets with the exact same things in them thinning out the player base. We got a guild system for a diminishing playerbase rather than CONTENT!