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It will be very interesting to see what Valve have up their sleeve for this one, as their card game Artifact seems to be dying.

How does the saying go? You only get one chance to make a first impression. Well, Valve made a number of missteps with the release and so not many will come back to it. When you consider the fact that in 2018 over nine thousand games released on Steam there's a ridiculous amount of competition for everyone and Valve aren't above that.

First, take a look at this (thanks SteamDB):

Artifact went from a high point of over sixty thousand players to around only two thousand in the space of about two months. It's bleeding players, quickly, and that's quite alarming. When you adjust the chart on SteamDB to look at it over a single month of "Players every day" it's showing a sad downwards trend. Unless they do something drastic, the player-base is likely to die off completely within another three to six months.

So where did it go wrong? In my opinion, Valve's decision to initially release it with zero progression and no way to earn anything without some form of extra payment was a poor one. In my original review, I did note that it could be a "deal-breaker for some" and that likely attributed to people not coming back. Valve did add some progression and unlocking systems with the "Build Your Legend Update" but the damage was already done. By the time the update was released Artifact had already lost around fifty thousand from their players per day.

It certainly hasn't helped that the Artifact team has gone a lot quieter. Take their Twitter for example, during December they put out around thirteen tweets to keep the community going. How about January? None. It doesn't exactly inspire confidence. I think Valve could honestly learn a lot from other developers at this point, a lot of games are successful not just because the game is good, but because they're constantly messing with the community and Valve has a history of being too quiet until they do something.

The biggest problem for Artifact now is the players that remain will be dedicated players that have likely honed their skills rather nicely. Anyone jumping in now and playing online is probably going to get their arse thoroughly handed to them and likely not come back often if at all.

Truthfully, as excited as I was for it, my own feelings on it have fizzled out as well. I can't quite put my finger on why exactly, since I do like the basic gameplay of it. It certainly doesn't help that people I was going to play with have also parted ways with it. A community just didn't build around it and so if Valve wish to keep it alive, their only real option left is likely just to make it free to play. It will be interesting to see what they do.

None of that is addressing the elephant in the room, which is that Valve vastly overestimated their pull with gamers. I've said it before and I will say it again, Valve are sitting on some IP that would seriously turn heads. If they put out a Left 4 Dead 3, Portal 3 or Half-Life 3 (or all of them) this would be a very different story. Not because I'm some sort of mad fanboy or something, they're just what most of their actual fans seem to be waiting for.

You can find Artifact on Steam.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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39 comments
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jardon Jan 23, 2019
Man, this sucks to hear. I bought the game and have really been enjoying playing it (convoy all day). Overall I have many hours into it and have spent maybe $25 in total. I really think the community outrage was just them lashing out about not getting the game that they wanted. We've seen the same model with other games and its not really a big deal. It seems mostly that players are just sticking one to Valve for not making what they wanted (I kind of understand this but it doesnt mean Artifact isnt a good game).

Oh well.
Salvatos Jan 23, 2019
I'm loosely in the camp that thinks Valve will likely shoot themselves in the foot even if they do make a Half-Life 3. Maybe not the other two (I really don't know anything about L4D, and Portal doesn't seem too hard to get right if you have the right engine for it and reputable writers), but there's a very, very thin chance of it living up to expectations after all those years of overhype. Much smarter move in my opinion to not make the game people want than to ruin the game they would have wanted.
pb Jan 23, 2019
They should have released it as f2p for casual players to enjoy with the $20 starter pack to get in the competitive matches or whatever. They would make lots of money on card sales and commissions anyway. Now, with these reviews, who's going to shell out $20 to try the game?
Creak Jan 23, 2019
Quoting: jardonWe've seen the same model with other games and its not really a big deal.
I think that might be the deal actually, the same game already existed before (several time I would say). So what's the interest in investing time and money into yet another CCG then?

I almost bought Artifact as well. As a Dota 2 player, I was expecting a F2P game with lots of cosmetics stuff to buy (cards with hats!), which I don't think is something that already exists in CCGs -- F2P, yes, but with only cosmetic purchase, not that I can recall. But I was disappointed to see it was the complete opposite: you have to buy the game, and you have to buy your progression... not at all what I was expecting from a Valve game derived from the Dota universe. They might have been too greedy on this one.

I actually don't really care about having a 3rd opus of some Valve game. If it happens, hooray! but I can also live without, there are so many gems in Steam that can make me wait patiently ;)


Last edited by Creak on 23 January 2019 at 2:08 pm UTC
dubigrasu Jan 23, 2019
I think that one way or another it will bounce back. Looking at how Valve takes care of their games over time, I'm thinking that if there's a way to "fix it" Valve will find it eventually.
lucinos Jan 23, 2019
Maybe they should think my idea, make it free to play for linux! If linux has such a small share then it does not make it any different financially for a game that support it anyway :-P
Beamboom Jan 23, 2019
"Valve are sitting on some IP that would seriously turn heads."

I gotta say though, that there's enough game devs out there who only churn out sequels once they get a success. Totally cool of Valve to try and establish new IPs instead of just milking their old ones. They don't deserve even a pinch of criticism for that - only what they did wrong with the release itself.
Creak Jan 23, 2019
Quoting: lucinosMaybe they should think my idea, make it free to play for linux! If linux has such a small share then it does not make it any different financially for a game that support it anyway :-P
But if you buy a game on Steam, it's available on all the platforms. So people will get it for free on Linux and play it on Windows...
lucinos Jan 23, 2019
Quoting: Creak
Quoting: lucinosMaybe they should think my idea, make it free to play for linux! If linux has such a small share then it does not make it any different financially for a game that support it anyway :-P
But if you buy a game on Steam, it's available on all the platforms. So people will get it for free on Linux and play it on Windows...

That can not be a big problem. There are many ways to do it, the most obvious is to have something like many games do have a free demo, that will just be the game for free but only available for linux.
nullzero Jan 23, 2019
And lets not forget that Magic the Gathering Arena (the grandaddy of TCG) had their open beta released just before Artifact, being both f2p and extremely user friendly compared to last online iterations.

It also works fine installing through Lutris. I was hyped and going to buy Artifact, but when I finally got to install MTG (in linux too) I never came back.


Last edited by nullzero on 23 January 2019 at 3:55 pm UTC
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