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.
Quoting: KimyrielleSo they made a game for an already over-saturated market (how many card games did we see the past 2 years or so?), compete against a firmly entrenched product (Magic The Gathering), and in a genre they have no experience with, while about 90% of their fan-base was hoping for something completely else (HL3)...and somehow thought that would go well?(Emphasis mine.) Didn't they have MTG's creator on board? Or did he just endorse/comment on the game?
Quoting: slaapliedjemaybe I am the odd man out, but I just don't 'get' CCG games that are digital. It's not like you can actually collect anything, it's all 1s and 0s.I mean, I don't get people who collect actual cards either. It's just cardstock. But if the gameplay is actually fun and the business model isn't poorly-disguised gambling, sure. I love the tactical aspect of it and you can do a lot more when the player doesn't need to perform complex operations or remember an excessive number of variables.
Quoting: sarmadIt would probably do better if it was sold as an actual physical board game. Why would anyone play a board game on a computer rather than a table?
- Can't afford a physical game (paper is heavy and expensive compared to software and if you have to ship it overseas you'll probably pay double)
- No one to play with nearby and/or with a compatible schedule
- No good space for in-person gaming
- Mechanics that can't be realized IRL or that would be a huge hassle to handle manually
- More complex variable tracking (things like HP on each creature, keywords and effects that can be added to or removed from cards semi-permanently, increasing point allocation over time, etc.)
- Animations, music, various forms of social interaction (streaming, online tournaments, text/voice chat with larger groups of people, etc.)
- Instant purchase and/or trading and delivery
I mean, I can think of a few things, and this is just thinking about CCGs in particular.
Last edited by Salvatos on 23 January 2019 at 11:04 pm UTC
Artifact was dead in the water even before the other things. It was competing with MTG:A
Quoting: slaapliedjemaybe I am the odd man out, but I just don't 'get' CCG games that are digital. It's not like you can actually collect anything, it's all 1s and 0s.
You certainly lose something in the transition, but what you gain in possibility space is substantial. The game can keep track of hit points, buffs, and other effects. You can have an ability with random elements, like damage a random enemy on the game board, you can even have a card transform into another that neither you nor your opponent has.
As I said, I'm sure something's lost between mediums, but as a game developer I find the possibilities of going digital really interesting. Like going from the tabletop role-playing games of old to the first computer RPGs; except in that example it's actually the older medium, I'd argue, that has so many more creative possibilities. But both have their strengths :)
Last edited by HadBabits on 23 January 2019 at 11:55 pm UTC
Quoting: bradgyAdd me on steam if you want to play sometime :)
Hey, I'd like to play Artifact with someone :) What's your steam name? Or you could also add me, my name is wfstuff
Quoting: TheSyldatPersonnaly I bought the game but I'm waiting to see if the game will receive any extensions of cards if at all.
Because right now the card pool is fairly limited and things gets boring real quick.
The first card expansion was reported to be prepared before the game launch. I don't think they'll release it any time soon, though - probably they'll bundle it with bigger update/game relaunch later this year.
WotC have been heavily promoting MTGA along side the paper format and in the online space for nearly the last full year, to the point that many either plan to, or even already have, jump ship from MTGO and Magic Duels and even the active Hearthstone playerbase has, to my understanding, taken a small hit from the MTGA beta. WotC have also over the last year released sets like Dominaria and Guilds of Ravnica that have a special appeal for those of us who left the game long ago and most of the last three years of sets have had elements that hearken back to the '95 to '05 era of the game. MTG is sorta like the Coke of CCGs, and it's hard to overcome that brand loyalty especially when there's an active promotional push going.
Hearthstone eats another large portion of the potential playerbase for online CCGs. Activision Blizard don't have quite the same long running legacy as WotC in the format, but Hearthstone is the current torchbearer of the Warcraft legacy (itself dating to '94) and some of that fanbase can be legit fanatical and practically obsessive about anything associated with the property. They're kinda the Pepsi of CCGs at this time, even if not actively promoting on the level of WotC
On top of all this MTG and Hearthstone have both gotten a surge of renewed interest recently due to the announcement last summer that Fantasy Flight is no longer doing the Android Netrunner LCG due to their licensing of Netrunner from WotC having expired (in October 2018 IIRC).
Enters Valve with a CCG with a whole of just over 300 cards and a legacy of being a side project to DotA2, a game whose own history and legacy are a mixed bag in the public consciousness, and a $20 Fee-to-Pay (yes, I am indeed stealing from Jim Sterling here) format going against Hearthstone with it's five years of set releases (1183 cards in Standard) and fanatical fanbase as well as against MTGA with the full allotment of current Standard sets (1389 cards) and near three decades of history both of which are free-to-play. If they had released a year ago and dropped two to three additional sets since they might have had a chance with people having invested significant time and money, but, no matter how good their mechanics may be by comparison, they stood little chance of drawing and retaining significant interest in this environment.
Mind, I personally have no horse in this race, since I enjoy getting my CCG fix by playing MTG Puzzle Quest and have little to no interest in going back to this kind of format unless WotC ever get smart and release the older sets in an online LCG type format (I'd be happy to pay $20 per set to play in an online retro-vintage type format [all sets Alpha through Future Sight say])
Last edited by vlademir1 on 25 January 2019 at 3:22 am UTC
slaapliedje Jan 25, 2019
Pretty much anything that says 'card game' in a digital form, I just ignore. I think I have Slay the Spire, and I think that mentions something about cards for abilities, so I still haven't tried it.
Quoting: slaapliedjeIf someone made a Munchkin or INWO online game, I'd be all over that. Not going to buy some other card game just because it's Valve.
Pretty much anything that says 'card game' in a digital form, I just ignore. I think I have Slay the Spire, and I think that mentions something about cards for abilities, so I still haven't tried it.
OT, but:
I've noticed in the past two weeks two promotions for elder scroll games, so i got excited. Until i saw they were for the MMO and the card game...
slaapliedje Jan 30, 2019
Quoting: HadBabitsYeah, the strength of CRPGs, is usually that you don't have to find other players for it, but then you lose all that interaction.Quoting: slaapliedjemaybe I am the odd man out, but I just don't 'get' CCG games that are digital. It's not like you can actually collect anything, it's all 1s and 0s.
You certainly lose something in the transition, but what you gain in possibility space is substantial. The game can keep track of hit points, buffs, and other effects. You can have an ability with random elements, like damage a random enemy on the game board, you can even have a card transform into another that neither you nor your opponent has.
As I said, I'm sure something's lost between mediums, but as a game developer I find the possibilities of going digital really interesting. Like going from the tabletop role-playing games of old to the first computer RPGs; except in that example it's actually the older medium, I'd argue, that has so many more creative possibilities. But both have their strengths :)
The advantage of CCCGs would be that you won't have 'friends' trying to steal your most valuable cards (like happened with some of my 'friends' and their need to steal my MtG cards...
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