Increasing playerbase

VIRTUALSELF

Phrourach
@Baudin Toolan @Hydna

With the new gamemodes, artifacts and gods being released the past year or two, what are your plans on getting new players to play the game? I love the updates, but atm the game is dying faster and faster. A server barely fills out the 4 core oceans these days, i can't even imagine how it looks like on other servers than .EN

Does INNO have any plans on advertising for the game? Why do you see a lot of ads for Forge of Empires, Elvenar etc., but i literally havent seen an ad for Grepolis the past 5 years or so.

My question is really, what are the plans for Grepo if you ask Inno? Are we talking Grepolis 2, better advertising, steam release etc.? I think your last 5000 active players deserves an answer
 

Baudin Toolan

Grepolis Team
Information regarding advertising isn't something we have as it's not something we have control over, we being the support team. We don't know about any potential changes to the game relating to increased advertising but the game is still being actively updated and we've got more cool updates coming in future months.
 

VIRTUALSELF

Phrourach
But could you pass on the message or something like that?

Credit for the good new updates, i think the team is doing good. But if there will be no one to play them, does it really matteR?
 

maxilex

Phrourach
To my mind, the interface looks as old as the game is. I am sure that is what puts new faces off playing.

Whilst some of the challenge of the game is in dealing with the ancient interface, if it has problems which have to be addressed using add ins, which then slow the browser down to the point of wading through treacle, it just isn't appealing.

Look at the other games available, fast, flashy, eye catching and considerably more user friendly than this.

I dont know how WoW or Call of Duty stack up against this [as other alliance based, cooperative, 24/7 games], but I bet it is a lot slicker. Then city building games are also more elaborate.

So, we have a clunky game, on a dull and super frustrating interface which has us spending a fortune and keeps us up at nights - I have no idea why I play, let alone anyone else :oops:
 

Reimu Hakurei

Chiliarch
To my mind, the interface looks as old as the game is. I am sure that is what puts new faces off playing.

Whilst some of the challenge of the game is in dealing with the ancient interface, if it has problems which have to be addressed using add ins, which then slow the browser down to the point of wading through treacle, it just isn't appealing.

Look at the other games available, fast, flashy, eye catching and considerably more user friendly than this.

I dont know how WoW or Call of Duty stack up against this [as other alliance based, cooperative, 24/7 games], but I bet it is a lot slicker. Then city building games are also more elaborate.

So, we have a clunky game, on a dull and super frustrating interface which has us spending a fortune and keeps us up at nights - I have no idea why I play, let alone anyone else :oops:
I agree with this, the game feels the same like it did back in 2012. 10 Years ago it was ahead of its time but now its basically the same. There were some minor tweaks to the UI over the years but nothing significant. For example you are limited to uploading a 180x240 avatar in 2021 lol.
 

Seriko Lee

Lochagos
I have an idea that may keep the game alive like if you like 2 or more cities after losing one.
You get like a supply ship that gives away resources for 7 days so you can rebuild.
Even an alliance supply ship that routinely supplies allies is a good start rather than forcing us to use the marketplace.
 

Reimu Hakurei

Chiliarch
I have an idea that may keep the game alive like if you like 2 or more cities after losing one.
You get like a supply ship that gives away resources for 7 days so you can rebuild.
Even an alliance supply ship that routinely supplies allies is a good start rather than forcing us to use the marketplace.
ah yes cant wait to get a supply ship with 5000 resources each arriving in my cities every 7 days
 

Seriko Lee

Lochagos
ah yes cant wait to get a supply ship with 5000 resources each arriving in my cities every 7 days
I mean if you have like 10,000 cap the ship will give you the cap amount, clash of clans have a similar mechanic but it grows over time when you leave it there.
Besides if am angry, I would search a world to pvp someone on their home turf.
You v.s me
 

Attachments

  • 845c042281c092f43c1975abd2e702b2.jpg
    845c042281c092f43c1975abd2e702b2.jpg
    58.5 KB · Views: 18
Last edited:

nazgulstrike

Hoplite
As someone who's not played for 10 years, logging back in to see the same UI as 2011 was surprising, I don't mind it as it's familiar but not sure how first timers feel about, even in 2011 it looked like Runescape. I'd be interested in knowing the average age of players, do these type of games intrigue the youth? I'd imagine it's too slow paced nowadays. Seems it's solely focussed in raking in money for gold, those are the only real additions I've noticed. Doesn't look like its managed to stay relevant, I haven't seen or heard anything about Grepolis in my 10 year absence for example, so I'm not sure how the game is advertised.

Would love to see a new influx of players, the comradery and competitiveness of the worlds is what really made this fun.
 

Seriko Lee

Lochagos
As someone who's not played for 10 years, logging back in to see the same UI as 2011 was surprising, I don't mind it as it's familiar but not sure how first timers feel about, even in 2011 it looked like Runescape. I'd be interested in knowing the average age of players, do these type of games intrigue the youth? I'd imagine it's too slow paced nowadays. Seems it's solely focussed in raking in money for gold, those are the only real additions I've noticed. Doesn't look like its managed to stay relevant, I haven't seen or heard anything about Grepolis in my 10 year absence for example, so I'm not sure how the game is advertised.

Would love to see a new influx of players, the comradery and competitiveness of the worlds is what really made this fun.
True I use to encounter ad's about the game but gave it a shot for a month but the school took up most of my time so I removed that account.
Gold would have a positive impact rather than being a pain like letting the a alliance hold tournaments of their own choicing and each alliance member can place the prizes even inno games can add on to the reward set up.

E.G: I founded an alliance with 30 players and I decided to host a chariot tournament, my members can give buffs or whatever they can as prizes then the host faction can determine how much each faction wins with the cost 50 or 25 gold.

2. Even whales can give at least 100-300 gold as rewards for 1st place and etc.

3: The mechanics of the tournament rewards can be similar innogames annual events can add 1 more city and so much more to make everyone a winner.

But this is just my own optional cause the system is already there but the suggestions are key I guess just like clash of clans.

While rewards for players that give great suggestion which cause growth will be encouraging as a bonus package.
 
Last edited:

Emberguard

Hekatontarch
I'd be interested in knowing the average age of players, do these type of games intrigue the youth? I'd imagine it's too slow paced nowadays.
While pacing is an issue in its own right, I think the biggest issue on entry to the game is purely the interface. Too many conflicts in the presentation of where to find things. Too much hidden away info. The Advisors detract from the game big time not because of what they‘re selling, but because of how it’s implemented into the interface.

Overview on mobile for example. Why do we have multiple versions of it??? By putting a Advisor Overview in settings you’re making the Island Overview completely useless even if the Advisor is active! I should be able to click overview from the game screen without touching the settings and not have to then look for a different overview because half the info is missing even though there’s an active advisor

Been playing a week and a half and only just now starting to figure out the interface. Given the free advisors are only there for 3 days or something it shouldn’t take anywhere near a week to get familiar with the interface. It needs some serious consolidating to fix the conflicts in the visuals

The game concept itself has potential to keep my interest, the interface is the main thing letting it down
 
Last edited:

CatPuncher10

Lochagos
These super fast worlds make it extremely challenging for somebody to get invested. I personally can't no-life a speed 4/5 world. I'd like to see a "OG" server, no island quests, and no hero's and see if any old school cats bite on the concept. So much happens when the game starts with the tasks, attack this village 100x, do this do that. Keep it simple, people are dumb. I use to love this game, I dislike some of the changes and it's evident other do also. Still plenty of money to be made off of us.

-CATPUNCHER
 

Forwandert

Taxiarch
These super fast worlds make it extremely challenging for somebody to get invested. I personally can't no-life a speed 4/5 world. I'd like to see a "OG" server, no island quests, and no hero's and see if any old school cats bite on the concept. So much happens when the game starts with the tasks, attack this village 100x, do this do that. Keep it simple, people are dumb. I use to love this game, I dislike some of the changes and it's evident other do also. Still plenty of money to be made off of us.

-CATPUNCHER

I'd like to see a older server again but they would probably only need to revert back to when they changed the island farms over to these new ones. That was the point onwards I really cba with the game. Don't think it needed all these hero's etc and artemis could have stayed on the old hero servers (are they even called that now? Achilles etc?) super fast servers are only every 3/4 years though so I don't think they ever got the balance right with them anyway especially these shorter server versions now. Only issue with an older server would be it's been tried previously for one of grepos anniversaries and it was pretty buggy from memory was.good fun though but it did make you think more highly of somethings that had improved at the time.

To put a suggestion to the initial question though. Inno literally have a huge playerbase across various games and huge database of contact details and I don't believe I've every received any emails from them about Grepolis from any email account I use for Innos other games. I pretty sure players of Innos other games wouldn't be offended by a single email a year or twice yearly giving suggestions of other available games within the company.

I also think these shorter versions aren't actually bad for playing and could be quite a big selling point for older gen players. Years ago you was literally signing away your life and commiting to 12/18 months to complete one if going for the win (even longer speed 1 etc), and wait what seemed like forever holding WW till enough players stopped logging in. Probably the only reason I started to quit just before WW kicked in on any servers after one that dragged for about 6 months+ after for no reason.
 
Last edited:

MainKiller07

Hekatontarch
I'd like to see a older server again but they would probably only need to revert back to when they changed the island farms over to these new ones. That was the point onwards I really cba with the game. Don't think it needed all these hero's etc and artemis could have stayed on the old hero servers (are they even called that now? Achilles etc?) super fast servers are only every 3/4 years though so I don't think they ever got the balance right with them anyway especially these shorter server versions now. Only issue with an older server would be it's been tried previously for one of grepos anniversaries and it was pretty buggy from memory was.good fun though but it did make you think more highly of somethings that had improved at the time.

To put a suggestion to the initial question though. Inno literally have a huge playerbase across various games and huge database of contact details and I don't believe I've every received any emails from them about Grepolis from any email account I use for Innos other games. I pretty sure players of Innos other games wouldn't be offended by a single email a year or twice yearly giving suggestions of other available games within the company.

I also think these shorter versions aren't actually bad for playing and could be quite a big selling point for older gen players. Years ago you was literally signing away your life and commiting to 12/18 months to complete one if going for the win (even longer speed 1 etc), and wait what seemed like forever holding WW till enough players stopped logging in. Probably the only reason I started to quit just before WW kicked in on any servers after one that dragged for about 6 months+ after for no reason.


Yea, I can remember when the farms went on like a happiness/loyalty thing and you can hit them with a normal tribute or like attack them which upset them to a point (if you were unlucky or dumb) to where you literally had to put down some rebels. No heroes, only four gods, so like when a new god, event, stuff like that...some advertising should be spent on gamer websites & locales to get the word out about the game. Maybe even if they could look into sponsoring a Youtube video...that would get a hit too. We would see an influx and I know a few youtubers that have a large audience and they've done game sponsered ads before.

Its the modern age of marketing...sponser one of their videos, they cut together a promo for the game, then boom. Video comes out, gets views and we see an influx...however slight/big that might be.
 

Emberguard

Hekatontarch
and I don't believe I've every received any emails from them about Grepolis from any email account I use for Innos other games. I pretty sure players of Innos other games wouldn't be offended by a single email a year or twice yearly giving suggestions of other available games within the company.
I already got an email for that, but it was given to a inactive account

63DFA619-A04D-4343-A7CF-C48B7969FEB4.jpeg
 
Should Inno invest in advertising to bring new players in? Absolutely. This is still one of the largest war games available and at the very least they should commit to keeping 8 oceans filled in their flag ship servers. The depth that large worlds added made the game more intriguing and made the game more complex than just beating up on the other team. As the worlds get smaller, more players will check out.

Will inno invest in advertising? Well they’ve made very few good decisions in the last five years. And of those few, even less haven’t had the plug pulled.
 

Zen Shadow

Lochagos
I hate to keep beating the same drum. Yes, Inno should advertise, but game balance needs addressed. There is no point in advertising for new players if they join and build cities and then get eaten fresh out of BP by someone blowing an average person’s monthly pay on being bigger and stronger. As the game does have a significant learning curve, retention of new players will require some form of spending limit to rebalance the game. Sure, we old players can train and mentor players and even show restraint against new players, but in the end, avoiding P2W mechanisms would be the best way for the devs to bring back the 20k plus player servers. Capping spending sounds like bad business, but 2k players spending 2 million dollars total is nothing compared to 20k players spending 10 million total. More profit from more players, not less profit from a dwindling player base is what I’m affirming.
 

Zen Shadow

Lochagos
I hate to keep beating the same drum. Yes, Inno should advertise, but game balance needs addressed. There is no point in advertising for new players if they join and build cities and then get eaten fresh out of BP by someone blowing an average person’s monthly pay on being bigger and stronger. As the game does have a significant learning curve, retention of new players will require some form of spending limit to rebalance the game. Sure, we old players can train and mentor players and even show restraint against new players, but in the end, avoiding P2W mechanisms would be the best way for the devs to bring back the 20k plus player servers. Capping spending sounds like bad business, but 2k players spending 2 million dollars total is nothing compared to 20k players spending 10 million total. More profit from more players, not less profit from a dwindling player base is what I’m affirming.
As an example, I am currently on EN 139 with 27 cities and could take more. I spent about 80 dollars in my 4 months on the server. However, I remember spending about the same a couple years ago and having to just ghost out because my alliance was just out of BP and some heavy spenders took 200 point cities on our core islands overnight and immediately built those cities into 10k point cities. It wasn’t strategy or good game play, just big wallets. I’m experienced and don’t care, but a new player would quit and never play again due to that kind of gold abuse. You have to cap spending if you want to get new players to stay.
Sorry for the double post.
 
Top