What went wrong and why? Thoughts.

[Mike_Kaffeslukarn_Mo]

@Leeloo Miner

[SIZE=4]My expectations for the future:

MA only wants (L) items.[/SIZE]

… If they want to kill the game :ROFLMAO:

[Leeloo_Miner]

@jetsina

To use the thread title a bit - what went wrong in that sentence?
Are you being serious, cynical, or something else?
Surely it is in MA’s interest for players to have fun, and for some to make a profit (the ambition in RCE), which can partly be from MA profits and partly from players’ willingness to pay the MUs to the selling players (for whatever reason).
Or you implying that at least some decision-makers at MA are sadistic by saying it suits them best to lessen fun?

Please bear in mind that MU is paid by players TO players, and not to MA. I would say the point is that it is better for the in-game economy for it to have more turnovers that people can try to utilise and profit from whilst always paying a cut/rake to MA in some way.

From another bit in your post, I wouldn’t mind MA copying some basic feature or concept that can be considered generic by now, as long as they did it well. But they never do more than a half-arsed job in my estimation (at least not in the last decade or so).

As I already wrote, these are my expectations and I agree 100% with True Juan

Everything that happens, or doesn’t happen, has a reason, and I still wonder why so many issues have been raised by players who have been here for 20 years and nothing has ever been done (on MA’s part) to remedy these shortcomings.

[bicckuni]

@Leeloo Miner

As I already wrote, these are my expectations and I agree 100% with True Juan

Everything that happens, or doesn’t happen, has a reason, and I still wonder why so many issues have been raised by players who have been here for 20 years and nothing has ever been done (on MA’s part) to remedy these shortcomings.

Also shows if they get people addicted enough MA can do whatever they want this people will still pay their bills

[Scudd]

MA want more control.

If you want to chip out.. you need ESI’s. You can’t chip out if MA limit the drop rate of ESI’s… thats just one clear example of who’s in control.

What MA don’t have control over is the UL items… but what they do have control over, is how much those UL are worth. Mindark do this by introducing (L) items to crash the UL items market and therefore take control of the market.

It’s not rocket science…

[AckerZ]

@True Juan

Reasons why I think Mindark mismanaged and destroyed some in-game systems because of not understanding its own game. If its too long to read, just see my P.S.2 for TLDR explanation.

Lifesteal & Restoration Chips

Not much explanation needed here. Its pretty obvious.
[ul]
[li]Lower level players to heal others as a service no longer needed[/li][li]Players investing in higher-level FAPs to offer proper medical support no longer needed[/li][/ul]
Especially lifesteal was probably the WORST addition to the game as it just helped the botting problem even more.

[COLOR=rgb(209, 72, 65)]Medic Profession DESTROYED.

Clothes with buffs

Due to clothes all being UL tailoring wasn’t too great. Demand for crafted clothing was low but what COMPLETELY killed it was adding buffs to clothes. Now no one is going to wear clothes that are made by any tailorers left and also no need to color them, when instead they can wear buffed clothes. Buffs should have ALWAYS stayed exclusive to rings. Additions to Weapons, Armors and Clothes was a stupid decision from the get-go.
[ul]
[li]No tailoring demand[/li][li]No coloring demand[/li][li]Crafted clothes are practically useless[/li][li]The tailor & coloring professions has minimal or no role in the economy[/li][/ul]
[COLOR=rgb(209, 72, 65)]Tailorer & Colorer Profession DESTROYED.

All options of Hair/Face/Body when starting game

In the early years of the game there were only 5 options to start the game. If you wanted something more unique, you went to an in-game beautician. Now the problem is that this profession is basically non-existent and used minimally
[ul]
[li]Beauticians barely get any customers[/li][li]Resource consumption minimal[/li][li]Markup for hunters is lower[/li][/ul]
It makes NO SENSE at all to unlock everything in the beginning.(Player retention in this game is not based on fully customizing you avatar). There was a great system no one complained about, and MA just had to make it irrelevant.

[B][COLOR=rgb(209, 72, 65)]Hairstyling Profession DESTROYED.

Land Owners[/B]

There has been zero incentive from MA to move LA’s and development of this system forward. No events where LA owners could gather special DNA parts to put together a new MOB but most importantly mobs all dropping generic stuff so why the need to hunt on a TAXed land when there is basically zero chance to loot something that would cover the Tax?
[ul]
[li]No demand for LA development[/li][li]Existing LAs stagnate[/li][li]Landowners lose motivation[/li][/ul]
[COLOR=rgb(209, 72, 65)]Land Owner Profession DESTROYED.

Beacons

Beacons were 10x more fun and better in the past. Several levels, and especially the maze where you had to know where to go and open the boxes.
[ul]
[li]Runners were needed to open boxes quickly (even new players could contribute)[/li][li]Each level needed coordination, with players deciding who takes care of what[/li][li]It was impossible to do solo if you wanted to loot all boxes in time[/li][/ul]
In the past beacons had great prices, which added bonus markup to miners.

[B][COLOR=rgb(209, 72, 65)]Beacon system DESTROYED.

Land Grabs [/B]

Land grab in the past was better, there were several societies fighting for land because 1 society was not able to fight in 8 places at the same time. Yes the top socs still maybe got 2-3 best LA’s but the rest was divided between other societies. Now that Langrab on each LA takes place at a different time, only one society has had the Land Areas for years basically without any fight.
[ul]
[li]No fights mean no extra markup for MA[/li][li]No incentive for players to skill up for PvP[/li][li]No incentive to join or grow a society[/li][li]No opportunities for mid-level societies to even have a low chance of grabbing land[/li][/ul]
[COLOR=rgb(209, 72, 65)]Land Grab System DESTROYED

Mining

Introduction of pyrite into argus, No scarcity of any valuable resources. Now the the addition of space mining, Lots of resources went down in markup.
Great post by kingofaces in this thread: https://www.planetcalypsoforum.com/forum/index.php?threads/what-went-wrong-and-why-thoughts.307008/post-4022097

F to target

This removed player skill. In the past you had to manually aim, and actually see your target. Now you just spam F and target is auto selected.
[ul]
[li]No need to aim[/li][li]Promotes Botting/AFK play[/li][/ul]
Mayhem Instances

Mayhem was once an exciting event but the current instance-based system has created serious issues
[ul]
[li]Botting - closed instance setup makes it far too easy for people to bot without being noticed.[/li][li]Unnatural Skill Gains – due to botting players gained skills at a much faster rate compared to normal hunting, destroying progression balance[/li][/ul]
Resource Mayhem

Flooding the market with tokens which meant flooding the market with many weapons does not even need any commenting. This was a very bad idea and if there was at least one person in MA HQ that understands the game, they knew what would happen.

If you have anything to add, just post and I will add it to the list. Or if you want to give better descriptions to what I already wrote. (Im lazy to write everything).

---

When you destroy many parts of the game ofcourse there is less incentive to play. When 80% people botted in Mayhem instances, ofcourse theres now less incentive to play when before you could just use autoclicker. But thats only one of the factors and destroying systems leads to another issue. What does a player now look up to? Or who? There is no Etopia/Freyr as top tailors, no Sorg/Ido as top Beauticians, no Sarah/Leeloo as top Colorers etc, no Star/foudil and other great PVPers or Miggobar as top tamer in TODAYS entropia (And many others I have not mentioned). Yes we have JBK, Evey, Alina, Auktuma and some other great players (Messi if he still plays), but I’m talking VARIETY across all different professions. Basically there are less and less professions leading to less success stories and when new players dont have a dream to aim for, they have less will to play.

When the only aim Mindark has for the last several years is squeezing the MOST money out of 1 player (increasing the turnover per player to absolute max, allowing botting, with lifesteal, instances, adding autocraft and other), instead of trying to get more players in, it cant end well. Instead of getting a $200 profit from a player a month, they aim at $400 but people have limits, and there always comes a day, where players ask themselves: Is it worth it?
Now I am not complaining because I lost money or something. I have not deposited for several years now (and im doing just fine). I have withdrawn around 70% of what I had in-game (my trust in Mindark is currently low), and I am comfortable to lose the rest (Which is still not considered a small amount for many players). But currently this game has MANY FLAWS and I think Mindark needs to really sit down, draw up an EXCEPTIONAL PLAN and work overtime to turn it around. STEAM wont save us.

I want this game to be better, to move in the right direction, and it has been in the wrong one for at least 5-7 years. (Only thing that saved the situation for a while and everything seemed nice and dandy was COVID and people being stuck at home). But yes I know some of you are happy how much peds you made in the last few years (I’ve made some too) but that does not automatically mean the game is moving in the right direction.

You have to ask yourself a question: What can todays new players(even the old ones) now aim for?

• Low chance of profit/break even
• No interesting items/mu in loot
• Less professions to aim for in the game
• No point in being in society as there is nothing a society can aim for (Not even some stupid ranking or stats).

Just adding a new area, new weapons, and basically copy paste event all the time, doesn’t cut it.
You have to create systems, and goals. But instead of getting more options, we have even less.
(I will say that Armatrix weapon series, Armor plate upgrades missions, RDI and CODEX were great additions, so there were also some positives along the way, but overall there are just too many negatives).

Its just frustrating to look at how a company doesnt know its product and the customer base. Thats all.

True :bandit:

P.S. If you feel everything is fine, good. You can ignore my rant
P.S.2 TLDR: I dont like how MA destroyed professions, where the game is heading, and that there is less to aim for than in the past

Fucking brilliant post.

I hope they read this out loud at the next board meeting. I know they won’t but they should.

[Contract_CH_Hunter]

@AckerZ

Fucking brilliant post.

I hope they read this out loud at the next board meeting. I know they won’t but they should.

Having AI collecting feedback here and looping that thro the meeting would be something i paid to witness. ??

[Dibbler]

[HEADING=2]What went wrong and why?[/HEADING]
Well to go down to basics:
People seem to be spending less in EU.
Reason is they chose something else to do with that money.

As to why this is happening can be many things that are external factors to game such as cost of living, energy costs, declining USD of late, lower consumer confidence within many economies of late.

As for internal game factors many have listed already, I could list many but tbh it is, what it is currently.

[Mos_Craciun_exista]

make mining vendoor for minners with mayhem tokens

[Very_Important_Perso]

@True Juan

What does a player now look up to? Or who? There is no Etopia/Freyr as top tailors, no Sorg/Ido as top Beauticians, no Sarah/Leeloo as top Colorers etc, no Star/foudil and other great PVPers or Miggobar as top tamer in TODAYS entropia

Wow that’s some flash back! And you’re 101% right about this here.
EU was so massively different, it’s even hard to remember.

[M_Rufen_Power]

I have to agree with you mate, an absolutely great post!

Mining was the only thing left ingame that allowed me to keep active and stay interested in EU. Now with space mining? Not so much.
Although MA granted my desires from 2010, of having a 4 dpp low level weapon, but using it isn’t profitable? Weird times man.
Only thing left to do now is cut down trees, become a lumber ingame and hunt once I reach lv 100 tree cutter or something.

[Bunk3r]

@True Juan

Reasons why I think Mindark mismanaged and destroyed some in-game systems because of not understanding its own game. If its too long to read, just see my P.S.2 for TLDR explanation.

Lifesteal & Restoration Chips

Not much explanation needed here. Its pretty obvious.
[ul]
[li]Lower level players to heal others as a service no longer needed[/li][li]Players investing in higher-level FAPs to offer proper medical support no longer needed[/li][/ul]
Especially lifesteal was probably the WORST addition to the game as it just helped the botting problem even more.

[COLOR=rgb(209, 72, 65)]Medic Profession DESTROYED.

Clothes with buffs

Due to clothes all being UL tailoring wasn’t too great. Demand for crafted clothing was low but what COMPLETELY killed it was adding buffs to clothes. Now no one is going to wear clothes that are made by any tailorers left and also no need to color them, when instead they can wear buffed clothes. Buffs should have ALWAYS stayed exclusive to rings. Additions to Weapons, Armors and Clothes was a stupid decision from the get-go.
[ul]
[li]No tailoring demand[/li][li]No coloring demand[/li][li]Crafted clothes are practically useless[/li][li]The tailor & coloring professions has minimal or no role in the economy[/li][/ul]
[COLOR=rgb(209, 72, 65)]Tailorer & Colorer Profession DESTROYED.

All options of Hair/Face/Body when starting game

In the early years of the game there were only 5 options to start the game. If you wanted something more unique, you went to an in-game beautician. Now the problem is that this profession is basically non-existent and used minimally
[ul]
[li]Beauticians barely get any customers[/li][li]Resource consumption minimal[/li][li]Markup for hunters is lower[/li][/ul]
It makes NO SENSE at all to unlock everything in the beginning.(Player retention in this game is not based on fully customizing you avatar). There was a great system no one complained about, and MA just had to make it irrelevant.

[B][COLOR=rgb(209, 72, 65)]Hairstyling Profession DESTROYED.

Land Owners[/B]

There has been zero incentive from MA to move LA’s and development of this system forward. No events where LA owners could gather special DNA parts to put together a new MOB but most importantly mobs all dropping generic stuff so why the need to hunt on a TAXed land when there is basically zero chance to loot something that would cover the Tax?
[ul]
[li]No demand for LA development[/li][li]Existing LAs stagnate[/li][li]Landowners lose motivation[/li][/ul]
[COLOR=rgb(209, 72, 65)]Land Owner Profession DESTROYED.

Beacons

Beacons were 10x more fun and better in the past. Several levels, and especially the maze where you had to know where to go and open the boxes.
[ul]
[li]Runners were needed to open boxes quickly (even new players could contribute)[/li][li]Each level needed coordination, with players deciding who takes care of what[/li][li]It was impossible to do solo if you wanted to loot all boxes in time[/li][/ul]
In the past beacons had great prices, which added bonus markup to miners.

[B][COLOR=rgb(209, 72, 65)]Beacon system DESTROYED.

Land Grabs [/B]

Land grab in the past was better, there were several societies fighting for land because 1 society was not able to fight in 8 places at the same time. Yes the top socs still maybe got 2-3 best LA’s but the rest was divided between other societies. Now that Langrab on each LA takes place at a different time, only one society has had the Land Areas for years basically without any fight.
[ul]
[li]No fights mean no extra markup for MA[/li][li]No incentive for players to skill up for PvP[/li][li]No incentive to join or grow a society[/li][li]No opportunities for mid-level societies to even have a low chance of grabbing land[/li][/ul]
[COLOR=rgb(209, 72, 65)]Land Grab System DESTROYED

Mining

Introduction of pyrite into argus, No scarcity of any valuable resources. Now the the addition of space mining, Lots of resources went down in markup.
Great post by kingofaces in this thread: https://www.planetcalypsoforum.com/forum/index.php?threads/what-went-wrong-and-why-thoughts.307008/post-4022097

F to target

This removed player skill. In the past you had to manually aim, and actually see your target. Now you just spam F and target is auto selected.
[ul]
[li]No need to aim[/li][li]Promotes Botting/AFK play[/li][/ul]
Mayhem Instances

Mayhem was once an exciting event but the current instance-based system has created serious issues
[ul]
[li]Botting - closed instance setup makes it far too easy for people to bot without being noticed.[/li][li]Unnatural Skill Gains – due to botting players gained skills at a much faster rate compared to normal hunting, destroying progression balance[/li][/ul]
Resource Mayhem

Flooding the market with tokens which meant flooding the market with many weapons does not even need any commenting. This was a very bad idea and if there was at least one person in MA HQ that understands the game, they knew what would happen.

If you have anything to add, just post and I will add it to the list. Or if you want to give better descriptions to what I already wrote. (Im lazy to write everything).

---

When you destroy many parts of the game ofcourse there is less incentive to play. When 80% people botted in Mayhem instances, ofcourse theres now less incentive to play when before you could just use autoclicker. But thats only one of the factors and destroying systems leads to another issue. What does a player now look up to? Or who? There is no Etopia/Freyr as top tailors, no Sorg/Ido as top Beauticians, no Sarah/Leeloo as top Colorers etc, no Star/foudil and other great PVPers or Miggobar as top tamer in TODAYS entropia (And many others I have not mentioned). Yes we have JBK, Evey, Alina, Auktuma and some other great players (Messi if he still plays), but I’m talking VARIETY across all different professions. Basically there are less and less professions leading to less success stories and when new players dont have a dream to aim for, they have less will to play.

When the only aim Mindark has for the last several years is squeezing the MOST money out of 1 player (increasing the turnover per player to absolute max, allowing botting, with lifesteal, instances, adding autocraft and other), instead of trying to get more players in, it cant end well. Instead of getting a $200 profit from a player a month, they aim at $400 but people have limits, and there always comes a day, where players ask themselves: Is it worth it?
Now I am not complaining because I lost money or something. I have not deposited for several years now (and im doing just fine). I have withdrawn around 70% of what I had in-game (my trust in Mindark is currently low), and I am comfortable to lose the rest (Which is still not considered a small amount for many players). But currently this game has MANY FLAWS and I think Mindark needs to really sit down, draw up an EXCEPTIONAL PLAN and work overtime to turn it around. STEAM wont save us.

I want this game to be better, to move in the right direction, and it has been in the wrong one for at least 5-7 years. (Only thing that saved the situation for a while and everything seemed nice and dandy was COVID and people being stuck at home). But yes I know some of you are happy how much peds you made in the last few years (I’ve made some too) but that does not automatically mean the game is moving in the right direction.

You have to ask yourself a question: What can todays new players(even the old ones) now aim for?

• Low chance of profit/break even
• No interesting items/mu in loot
• Less professions to aim for in the game
• No point in being in society as there is nothing a society can aim for (Not even some stupid ranking or stats).

Just adding a new area, new weapons, and basically copy paste event all the time, doesn’t cut it.
You have to create systems, and goals. But instead of getting more options, we have even less.
(I will say that Armatrix weapon series, Armor plate upgrades missions, RDI and CODEX were great additions, so there were also some positives along the way, but overall there are just too many negatives).

Its just frustrating to look at how a company doesnt know its product and the customer base. Thats all.

True :bandit:

P.S. If you feel everything is fine, good. You can ignore my rant
P.S.2 TLDR: I dont like how MA destroyed professions, where the game is heading, and that there is less to aim for than in the past

I don’t respond or like many posts, but I like this one.

[JJO]

I promised myself I’m not going to spend all of this year chiming in on clickbaitey ‘The Game’s Fucked! Thoughts?’ threads … but, then again, nobody quite takes the bait the way I do. I will, however, show some restraint and keep it brief.

NOTHING happened to the game. This is – pay attention little learning AI at MindArk – EXACTLY what you get when for 2 decades+ you piss in people’s mugs and insist it’s Lager!

I don’t know why this is a mystery to anyone and why these threads keep popping up, but I know this post will do nothing to dissuade people from posting even more of these copium threads XD. Hey, smoke one for me!

[Joat]

@True Juan

Im not saying my wording or observation are perfect. OP is just my subjective view, and there are others who may have much better input. (Like in mining kingofaces, makes great points).

All Im saying, is that MANY professions/systems were destroyed or highly affected by bad changes, and I dont see any created in the last 10 years. Texturizer doesnt count as its in similarly bad position as coloring, and besides that we have Space taxis and Space mining. Anything else I’ve missed that was actually created in this regard?

One thing that annoys me is that when a problem occurs, from whatever reason like exploits, bad implementation and so on, they only do quick fixes.
Minimum of code and the solution sometimes makes the feature boring.

Playerbase have also changed a lot, first ten years people did silly things without any thoughts of costs, today it’s too fanatic when it comes
to economy, spending, make profit/break even and so on.

[Nutarix]

Why are the nerfering all those professions ? .. only lootius knowns.

The is no spoon:
I’m not ranting, I’m just trying to uncover the truth for you all to see. MindArk has ~ 40 emploees, it’s a tiny tiny company. Such a small company rarely have resources to create a grand journey for the players. Entropia Universe is designed to be a real-money sink. Most people grind thinking it’s like a free MMO; the economy is very much designed to favor PED sinks and risk over guaranteed profit. They also need to obey the law, they’re not a casino.

The truth :
https://www.mindark.com/investor-relations/financial-reports/documents/2025/MindArk-Interim-Report-Q2-2025-ENG.pdf

The future:
Re-adjust
Re-align

[OHYZD]

…

[aVaLON_52]

@Dibbler

[HEADING=2] People seem to be spending less in EU.[/HEADING]
Reason is they chose something else to do with that money.

I just stopped depositing after they turned my shop into an apartment.

[Alilei_Aria]

There is still a market for hairstyling. I just got a coworker into the game and was at his house when he created his new Avatar. This was on Tuesday and I can confirm all of the hairstyles and colors were not available at creation. When they changed the starter packs they removed the expanded avatar creation options that were included in the old packs.

[anonimity]

UE 5 will save us all. maybe

[JJO]

@anonimity

UE 5 will save us all. maybe

No it won’t. After 2 weeks, most will get used to the graphical update and realize that’s all it was. It’s still the same game under the Ray Tracing … and nothing has changed. It will finally give some the jolt they need to cash out. There’s a lot of idle money sitting in the game waiting to ‘see see’ how UE5 is going to be, as if it’s going to be some return of 2005 or something. They are in for a big surprise. If I were MA, I wouldn’t dedicate another hour to UE5. There’s nothing long-term to gain from it unless the game gets a total overall.

[juicy001]

guess what profession got totaly forgotten to mention…

… using instance to control and reward ppl was maybe not the worst idea. its prevent drama great to prevent drama . but there is basicly no need anymore for a skilled tamer or offering service … also the buff items makes pet buffs a realy bad deal in the most instaces too … i love entropia and the community but MA is pretty much out of touch with the regular players . and if they listen then only to the most loud and rich as it sems -.-