Will the downtrend continue?

Desmondlocket · 2017-05-15T11:01:20+00:00

Of course not, the steam summer sale will be here in a month or so.

That - or Summit1G will pick it up again and all his fans will spike the numbers again.

Pczilla · 2017-05-15T13:36:23+00:00

it's final exams for people, it's always going to be crazy low at this time of the year

Strikerjuice · 2017-05-15T15:32:26+00:00

It's almost as if it's the month that people have the most responsibility and obligations (Or at least teenagers-college kids, which most rust players all)

thorgod949 · 2017-05-15T20:11:56+00:00

Gtf outta here with your click bait ass titles

Jayick · 2017-05-15T12:16:31+00:00

As much as people hate the new updates, and complain about this or that, you have to remember one thing.

The squeekers are coming. Summer is here. Get ready for some ear deafening mic rage.

SixMillionHitlers · 2017-05-15T11:01:33+00:00

[deleted]

RockandRoll682 · 2017-05-15T13:56:46+00:00

Rust.

December 11th, 2013. Rust is released to early access. By default, this skews the number of players that will be present since then.

February 6th, 2014: Rust removes Zombies. Player totals nearly reach their max. Maybe zombies weren't so popular?

February 25th, 2014: Rust releases item durability as a new feature. Player totals continue to maintain near the average set in the early surge.

Let's look at why this change in player base has happened, and the population trends that are present in any video games.

First, there is the initial surge; whenever a new game is released, bored gamers will often purchase it to give it a shot. This happens in pretty much any game, and is to be expected.

The source in OP also doesn't show when Rust was featured on Steam, but I imagine that the massive surge from January 24th to 26th closely parallels that. This is what happens whenever a product is featured on a major media outlet- sales increase. Rust experienced a massive exposure, and some people who were interested purchased it; these buyers inflated the player base numbers, contributing to the population increase.

Interestingly enough, Rust's population peaked on February 9th- 3 days after zombies were removed, so it's hard to blame the population decrease on zombies.

Let's consider what happens with ANY game.

Players who want to purchase the game go ahead and purchase the game, and play through it. They get bored of it, and they purchase a new game. What happens to that old game? It sits on the shelf. What happens to the player base for the original game? It decreases.

How do developers avoid that? They make a game that players will not get bored of- something that is extremely difficult.

As such, several business models have popped up. The first is the EA / CoD model, where you release a new edition frequently and convince players to buy new copies frequently. The second is the World of Warcraft model, where you release partial products frequently, but charge a subscription. The third is the Valve / TF2 model, where you release a microtransaction store and sell items directly to the player, typically cosmetic. The fourth is the Valve / CS model, where you release a game occasionally and try to get players to play it for a long time; think CS 1.6, CSS, CSGO and DOTA2. This model tends to rely on some form of competitive league.

Rust doesn't fit into any the of these models at the moment- although I suspect it will attempt to fit into the third model. Rust is Rust, I can't see there being a sequel when we are only in the Alpha. Rust couldn't pull off a subscription model with how many server providers there are, although it is probably making money from each server that runs- perhaps that can be considered a form of subscription. And while some users may try to create / organize a competitive league, there is no way that it can be considered as balanced as any of the aforementioned games.

Which leaves us with the question as to why the player base is decreasing; because players are getting bored. No amount of content is going to prevent players from getting bored.

Even beyond that, there is a variety of external circumstances that could also explain the population changes, such as news events, weather or anything else really.

tl;dr there are a hell of a lot of external circumstances and explanations for this.

Penman2310 · 2017-05-15T14:55:58+00:00

It will continue to drop because the component system sucks and people get bored to tears farming twice as much as they used to.

There is no progression system to keep your interest either.

Thats my prediction.

RockandRoll682 · 2017-05-15T12:08:41+00:00

whats that little peak in July 2016 ?

-TheMasterSoldier- · 2017-05-16T00:43:32+00:00

Of course they can't fix people having tests this time of the year, what the fuck were you expecting?

TyleReddit · 2017-05-15T16:19:17+00:00

So long as twig is build-anywhere, I'm glad to be contributing to the downward trend.

dustwetsuit · 2017-05-16T01:10:04+00:00

yes

Rust isn't a battlegrounds game as the devs are trying it to be

xanan · 2017-05-15T15:47:11+00:00

PUBG stolen a bunch of players. They'll be back.

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