Zorg Empire

This is also a suggestion forum. Please suggest ideas in small titles so I can collect them easily. Feel free to justify them.

Ie:
-Improve Interface
-Give posters to everyone
-Whatever

We had no ceremony this year or last year like we used to do, but Zorg Empire is now 6 years old. We have some players that are with us for that long. Most however, have already left for a long time.

They have not necessarily left because the game failed them. There are other reasons such as life and aging. For example if you start playing as a student, then 6 years later where you might have a kid, then your habbits will simply be a lot different.

There is one certain thing: Players come and go. The recycling is part of the game. We preder dedicated players though and this is why we persist in Zorg Empire to ASSIST old universes.

Getting new active players nowadays is very complicated. I do not want to write down a full essay on how and why but rest assured that we are well informed and this piece of information has not came for nothing. It is an advanced issue and a specialized one too. I am mentioning this because I want you to realize the level of difficulty that it is included.

I will only prompt you to look around you to ANY browser game you ever knew. Not necessarily similar to Zorg. 9 out of 10 browser games you knew 6 years ago now are completely deserted. It is a very difficult enviroment for browser games and we are fighting in a strong path for survival.

Where you can help us in players retain, is to instruct us on what features the newcomers need. We have our own ideas but the playerbase ideas help us prioritize them. There already have been suggestion we have yet not implemented - we hope to ammend this in the near future as there is going to be an increase in our workforce.

to clarify:
- you want us to post ideas, attached to this thread starter?

- not pm-ing you ideas?

- not starting new threads under title of new idea?

- just post an idea you have?

- no discussion on the posted idea, unless it's an addition or a different new idea

- no discussion on pro's and con's everyone thinks comes with an idea, open up a new thread to go into indepth discussion about one particular idea?

that what you want?

well then...
I stick to my earlier proposal, that there should be an option in the game where alien tech for faster engines or better weapons can be obtained by expeditions...chances of succes 10%...
- once obtained, tech study slot comes open for study, cause new tech needs to be studied
- to be of actual use you need alien resources to fuel this alien tech, again expedition 10 % successrate
- fueled and studied alien tech can be applied on top of say engines for speed or weapons or shields for strength
- boost is in percent...so say 10% boost over regular lvl or 20 or 30....you can stack techs...
- is one time use only! you can attack a player, boost your weapons, say 30% by stacking 3 alien tech with the fuel for that one attack.
- you wanna do it again? go get the fuel for it, by sending expeditions
- limit amount of stacks....say 5....you can have either 50% weapons boost...or divide over 5 techs...engines, shields, etc and all 5 have 10% boost
- again...only 1 time use
- have the alien tech or fuel "go bad" so there's no resource hording of this stuff, once gathered, it needs to be used within the week or it will be of no use...

this will help in gameplay:
1. a fight between small and big is no longer a "dead" end for the smaller guy
2. the endresult still is player versus player, so the end goal of obtaining this stuff is to have an advantage over the other
3. expedition serves a greater purpose now
4. there's no everlasting advantage, you have to continue doing this, but it enables otherwise unobtainable goals

my 2 rubies

feel free to disagree!

These are the suggestions I think would be most helpful. I edited this to include the suggestion titles Zorg wanted.

Interactive Tutorial
As has been mentioned elsewhere, I think the most helpful thing for retaining players in X would be some sort of interactive tutorial. For example: when a new player joins the game, a message could pop up, greeting them and telling them to build a solar plant and letting them know what the solar plant is for... Once they complete this, they get a message telling them to build a metal mine; someone mentioned the starting guide that Zorg has provides a good basic outline for how this tutorial could progress... Most people, today, expect it to be fairly obvious how to play a game when they first join, and it can quite unclear how to play when you first join. An interactive tutorial, I believe, would go a long way in at least helping new players earn a few points.

Longer inactivity period before lifting noob protection
evilbass noted that the time period when new player protection stops working is too short, as it takes some players a while to get into the game. I absolutely agree, and think this time period should be extended to something more like a week, instead of just a few days. Imagine starting a new account, playing for a little while, having fun learning how to play and building a few ships, but then not logging in for a few days because you are busy with life... when you come back, you discover that your ships have all been destroyed by a large player, even though you have only a few thousand points and should be under protection... This would make you much less likely to continue to play.

More Advanced Tutorial
I also thinks there needs to be a more advanced tutorial once players hit a certain point level (maybe 20k or so) that introduces basic game concepts like fleetsave.

Prevent "Supernoobs"
Preventing what others have referred to as "supernoobs" (players who sit below 100k with buildings and techs while amassing millions in fleet) from attacking small players is something that would also help with new player retention, and, imo, should really be looked into ASAP.

Moon on Home Planet
I also support the idea others have mentioned about a moon automatically put on the home planet... or maybe unlocked after the completion of one of the tutorials? Just a thought.

One last thing: Something needs to be done to prevent players from just over 100k from quitting... I don't know if that would be more attack zones (I would support this, but there is more controversy here) or something else altogether... I know that many players quit after crashing for the first time... There needs to be some way to keep up the moral of new players after they crash for the first time, so they stick around.

agree with pulsar...,
one way to retain guys after they get crashed... going over 100K for the 1st time...
I was one... lost a big fleet as I went over...
Is to have them build only a raiding fleet in the tuttorial and not a big fleet...
but focus on getting mine production up on say 12-19 planets... not sure here how many is best...
and doing basic defenses on the planets to stop raiding.. also doing only basic research.. keeping points down..
that way it will take them longer to breach 100 k if they did forget their fleet down...
and also if they did.., they would have loads of res being produced..relative to the fleet they lose..
and would make them maybe leave and come back as they dont lose as much..

I think Pulsar makes a lot of sense. Good comments.

Fleet points should always be visible, even if the fleet is in the air. That way, the predictability of someone being on or offline is more difficult. This will also deter some players from being 'Super Noob Fleeters'. Problem solved.

I like the Idea Torgard mentioned!
Like the defenses go up and down, when you build and get attacked, fleet is constructed and therefore points are gained.

The ingame tutorial or quest
As mentioned by Pusar and others as well.
Good idea, but in quest form, cause no newcomer is going to sit and read a lengthy users manual.

Available weaponry
There is another (much hated) tool already available: IPM
- make IPM also hit fleet and moon
- DF from fleet can be collected, also after IPM attack
counters to IPM are ABM and FS

I know the big fleet people will not like this last suggestion, but for them a solution IS present....the same as for anyone else...if you FS you're good, if you don't...anyone can get a piece of you!

Are we all just jumping on the band wagon here and taking existing ideas or previous suggestions to post now? If so, then I suggest all the old ideas that have been approved and implement them first. Then go through all old/recent posts from myself and others and grab relevant info there and post it here again.....seems that's what is happening anyway ....is there a competition going on that I don't know about lol

Sprog, I was just trying to be helpful and put what I see as the better ideas for retaining players in the right place. Come now.

Personally, I don't think fleet points should always be visible... This would really make fleet hunting quite difficult.

I just want to see some original ideas/suggestions.....not ones you, me and others have already posted.

I am not an admirer of all fleet scores showing either......but we do need a solution to stop the super noobs (really shouldn't be called super......nothing super in hitting new players with tiny fleets)

Surely Zorg can code it that anyone over 100k with fleet cannot hit anyone below 100k ....regardless if s/noob has fleet down or not.......