How to skyrocket the playercount and get this game out of financial downward spiral

[DickRichard]

1. Make the game free to play again, possibly with buyable cosmetics/whatever, as long as it doesn't affect the gameplay whatsoever.
2. Make a patreon, add a link leading to it to the launcher.
3. Get sseth to review it.[url=https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCD6VugMZKRhSyzWEWA9W2fg][/url]
4. Wait.
5. Watch as servers crash due to new players, which quite possibly will donate on patreon. (which they have link to on a silver platter)
6. Upgrade the servers from patreonbux allowing more players to join, creating an infinite money-upgrade loop.

I've seen the playercount and it's what, less than 100 at any given time these days? Heartbreaking. Entire universe to explore, but for who?

[Deantwo]

Sure it is a successful business plan for sone.
I am however not sure rather Haxus would be able to or want to do it like that.

possibly with buyable cosmetics/whatever, as long as it doesn't affect the gameplay whatsoever.

I like how you seem to assume this is super easy.
Name some games that has successfully done this early on without a budget or a full team of developers.

[jakbruce2012]

Hazeron used to be free to play, the player count was not much higher. Also it's 17+ now so less draw for most who would need F2P.

[Phenoix12]

1. Make the game free to play again, possibly with buyable cosmetics/whatever, as long as it doesn't affect the gameplay whatsoever.

Well buyable cosmetics sort of goes against some things since I'm pretty sure the end goal for Hazeron is to have most everything be player designed... including cosmetic items.

Switching to F2P and relying on donations alone could work but is a risky proposition since people can jus opt out of donating.

Let's assume best case scenario and every player is donating at least a dollar, even with like 100 players that would still be well below the amount Haxus earns with the subscription model.
While F2P would attract more people in the long run overall it has the risk to make less money.  Though it also has the potential to make more money if you get a lot of larger donations in the mix but that's a gamble.

[Minty]

people, people, please. free to play, pay to play, you're all missing the bigger picture: capitalism restricts the freedom and creativity of true visionaries such as haxus. the solution to hazeron's financial problems are to overthrow our bourgeoise overlords. can't run out of money to pay for the servers if money isnt real, the needs of all are accounted for, and heads are rolling

barring that, i think cosmetics/ftp are terrible ideas and the current model is more than fair

[Deantwo]

barring that, i think cosmetics/ftp are terrible ideas and the current model is more than fair

Agreed.
But I grew up with EverQuest, World of Warcraft, and EVE Online as subscription games and never had any issues paying for them, so I guess I am biased.

Also, the File Transfer Protocol makes for a bad business model for sure.

Well buyable cosmetics sort of goes against some things since I'm pretty sure the end goal for Hazeron is to have most everything be player designed... including cosmetic items.

Very true, unless anyone actually wants to pay for using the designer(s).

[DickRichard]

The main issue with this game is that it's obscure as hell. You can't expect to make profit off this if literally nobody knows about it. Reaching out to reviewers on youtube would be a good start. Steam release would be a step forward, combine that with F2P+donations and you can expect to make steady amount of money monthly.

Let's assume best case scenario and every player is donating at least a dollar, even with like 100 players that would still be well below the amount Haxus earns with the subscription model.

100 players with F2P and free youtube content creator advertisements? Please. This game is basically X4+Dwarf Fortress on crack cocaine. The issue is obscurity and abysmal playercount more than anything. Comparing giants like Everquest or WoW to SoH and claiming it's the same deal is ridiculous.

It's heartbreaking because this game really deserves a large playerbase given how much work it got put into. Haxus isn't in any better spot financially than he was pre-P2P, atleast in my understanding. If it's an issue of "it's not ready yet" rather than money then I get it, but how long will it be?

As for fear of sunken cost: make one itty bitty tiny galaxy F2P as a test run.

I've thrown my ideas out, I'm hoping Haxus will atleast consider some of them.

[Norm49]

As for fear of sunken cost: make one itty bitty tiny galaxy F2P as a test run.

Haxus could make the neutral zone (I don't remember the galaxy name) free to play as a test and learning base then the player will have to pay for the reset of the universe.

I think the actual price is a bit high compare to other game out there it is close to eve online but the new player will have a problem with that so maybe lower the pries at something like 5$. I think it can work.

[Minty]

if there was a galaxy that was free, nobody would ever pay for hazeron ever again.

i think a better idea would be letting anyone have one avatar for free, and limiting them to their solar system (perhaps by making warp and wormhole drives inaccessible, even if a veteran player dumps a bunch of patents and modules at their city.) and even if theyre taken in a ship away to other places by a real player, they cant interact with most things or build anything.

maybe even limit their max cities to three or four and keep them from using anything that might be resource intensive.

[Deantwo]

We have discussed "partially free to pay" ideas forever. I really don't see a good way to do it, ever.
We currently have a two week free trial, that is likely the best you are getting.
See: http://hazeron.com/wiki/index.php/Accoun...ation_Code

I will maybe agree that the price is a little high when compared to more feature complete titles though. But most players are repelled by any "pay wall" no matter how big, so it likely wouldn't be much better if even it was 5$/month.

100 players with F2P and free youtube content creator advertisements? Please. This game is basically X4+Dwarf Fortress on crack cocaine. The issue is obscurity  and abysmal playercount more than anything.

This kinda makes me think you haven't played in a while. The new designer and the new city systems really feel like they will repel more players than the "pay wall". At least in their current state, they are way too complex and confusing.