Development is good, but players?

[Spiker]

So, I know 95% of you that read this is probably going to disagree with me, but I'm throwing these idea's out here because literally not a single person has talked about this issue in the past few months. I believe the best way to brain storm is to give pretty much all the ideas you can unless they've been talked about already. So here goes.

Graal Kingdoms has grown and developed enough to the point where the content can keep new players active for some time while we create more content. Now I get the issue with "What about players already level 110 and have been playing for 10 years." Honestly, you've been around 10 years, if you want more content, you're gonna have to suck it up or wait because even 3 years of game play in ANY game would give you mad amounts of experience and items where you'd probably not want to play anymore.

New players is where it's at. New players are the ones that are going to be jumping in and learning about everything and wanting to play, while us oldbies need to be around to teach them stuff or show them how to RP. Yeah, there are really no oldbies around anymore to do that, but there have been system implemented to help new players with things that the system can tell them, without players (Since player count is low and there's not going to be a influx of players all of a sudden.)

Where do new players come from? Advertising. Graal Kingdoms is a certain type of game, and it's obvious not every person to play it will like it, but I remember back in the day when I first started playing and there were a bunch of players doing the exact same thing myself was doing. LEARNING how to play the game. How did all the other servers become more popular than PC? Advertising. The development was already there, the only thing that was needed was to show people the game. It's very rare for somebody to just find a game and install and play it, make an account, it's a hassle.

Unixmad allowed all these other games to be linked up with players facebook accounts, which then allowed Facebook to advertise and grow in player count. WHY are we still waiting for development on Facebook when there are enough people that sort of know what they're doing to try and help or fix Graal Kingdoms Facebook. Even after 1.5 years of it sitting dormant, we could have figured SOMETHING out. Why has development on Facebook stopped and why isn't the system allowed to be developed from outside sources or even developers on the server.

Now remember, this is just a showerthought for those wondering, but I really feel like something small could come from the Facebook aspect of Graal Kingdoms, and it was a great idea and concept back then, but was pushed to the side because content was lacking and during the time of Nico, those things just weren't getting done.

[Darklux]

"He's dead Jim". I want to open my reply with a small quote, I guess I don't have to bother about trying to explain it.

I think the state of GK just reflects the state of overall PC Graal. The game always relied on a big workforce of willing Developer-Players. iPhone and Facebook Graal have been released, but sometimes it seems to me, that no efforts are being taken to put anything back to it.

One thing I have to admit: I don't get why, even if I try to see the topic out of an economic perspective. To me, Graal was a good Indie-Game before that topic even got big. With some effort and investment on infrastructure and devtools Graal could be easily marketed as a 2D MMORPG SDK.

Only a small list of examples:
- Broken Serverlist
- No solid Devtools, Lacking pool of assortative Graphics to allow easy development, aside of the oldskool Pics1 and some free forum stuff
- No possibility to make money for good development, which probaply kills the MMORPG Aspect
- Dead Community
- Missing Marketing, no active marketing as powerful MMORPG SDK

If I put the general situation aside, Graal Kingdoms was always an eternal construction site. From the beginning, GK always felt a bit incomplete as the mudlib was never well connected to the game itself. Most elements were never implemented on GK, yet still actived in the mudlib and caused curious problems and bugs. Old players will joyfully renember random alchemy, or when trade tables allowed easily plat generation: you could just place on the table at very high prices, cast alchemy, and sell the created gold which now roughly had the value earlier set at the trading table. Quickly after 2002 GK became a economic simulation, that circled roughly around gear and event items. I renember players making hundreds of dollars just by selling their event gear, as the game - let's put aside some decorational additions - was just about who had the best stuff - or the highest level. Quickly, after some players slowly reached level 20 or 30 playing a fair game, more and more bugs were found to level in insane ways. A popular way of leveling for example: Trying to use the more or less broken "Stealing" skill on Bosses... After that the "engine" was more or less nonsense to me. Which caused gear to become even more important...

If there is any development at all, I hope, people are trying to create a fresh start without mudlib...