[SC] It's a story as old as time.

Hello,
I'm a new member on this forum and I am supposed to give my opinion since I'm not Gloria B. ..also subscribe to PewDiePie!
Jokes aside, I might be repeating ideas what seems a lot in this platform have been discussed about. I guess I can do that in this subdivision of the forum without risking any sanction from mods, right?

First of all one thing I noticed it's been brought up very often, not just here but in other platforms too, is that Darkorbit became Pay-to-Win. That means the game let you buy virtual items/gears with money giving the spender advanges over the other players and from here comes all the hate on the so called "wallet-warriors".

I completely agree but this was actually true from the release day. That was the business model they chose to use back than and not many know the rinks, also it was free with the possibility to win ca$h. And looking at the bigger picture the audience for online-games wasn't that huge compared to now with the opposite situation where good single-player games are hard to find. Everyone was new to this and enthusiast to play with someone on the other side of the planet. The online gaming community grow very fast. It's around 2004 that Web 2.0 catches on also so that make sense.
But only after playing for few years you realize and everybody did, the difference that is created between those who pay and the peasants which is always the larger part. That's why nowadays you see more and more online games selling cosmetics for money, for the most part.

This can be applied to Darkorbit as well. The game wan fun, the maps were full and newbies were just one step behind at the beginning even if the same system was running; later on questions started to come out, complains, bots and whatnot, because that's what this model creates; it's based on crafting new virtual-items, stronger than the previous, that customers can pay for. That's the form of income.
To put the icing in the cake Bigpoint decided to add the gambling (Booty Boxes) which is largely detested from video-gamers all around the globe and sees Big companies such as EA, Ubisoft, Activision getting bashed, even on loot boxes that drop cosmetics only.

Anyways this is the drafted story and I talked at length already. If you complain now about pay-to-win, and it's your right (because customer is always right haha), also remember it was here from the start, sadly. There wasn't any visible impact at the beginning.

I want to give my trust to the team though(I think it's not the same team it was back then? 2012 was the year BP laid off around 120 employees) for at least trying to deviate from the old path in the hope there will be improvements in the future. What else can they do, we can't go back. Gamers has shaped and game industry is going to another direction.
Humanity has played long bofore the advent of compluter technologies and always had been rules to make games fair for whoever gets involved on it. Only kings&queens wanted and could've won easy
And it's the right direction! Bigpoint also endorses Fairness in their products with transparent and balanced monetisation systems.
I can already see it on the way the new lasers can be obtained so that's nice.

Side note: gambling needs to be erased. With the Assembly you did a good job and there is room for improvements. My opinion is that the eqiupment in general needs to be optained with some effort of course but if you want to keep the gambling such as low drop rate and so on, it should be separeted from money. Basically you try your luck by playing the game. For example as it is the case of the new lasers in assembly, you play(for free) to obtain most of the resources to craft the item. And here you can make use of low drop rates on resources or as it is now, low amount of resources dropped and high request of those resources to craft the strong items. So all gears you get as a possible reward from Galaxy Gates (Lasers, Drone designs, Ships) and from Booty boxes, even if you have increased the percentages lately, needs a rework with a looking-eye on the Assembly system as a possible solution. (feedback)

Following the list of complains, and here I'll spit what I think, there is MCC dominating on every event, bots building their ships, both supposedly ruining the experience of new players.
I don't want to talk much about MCC as there is already a mega thread for this topic. And honestly everyone should be free to play and/or ally with anyone he/she wants...at his/her own risk. Neither I want to talk about bots; again everyone is free to play the way he/she likes...at his/her own risk.

Instead analysing the why and when these problems take hold would be interesting.
I'll say this though, CompanyvsCompanyvsCompany was the fondamenta of the game and it worked well; either if you look at it as a solution to the MCC side or to the bots.

Let's examine first what brought us to where we are now. A few keypoints here:
-Jump CPU- MCC
Cool idea but bad implementation. You just can't jump like that on enemy maps. It's supposed each company has some sort of countermeasures. You need to take the risk to jump through portals if you want to enter hostile maps. CvsCvsC lose one point here.
Newbies olso get less protection as they are more easily herassed by enemies. Company chat was an effective communication system that helped alongside with portal guarding, to take preventive measures against the invasors/s therefore protect Company's member.
As you can see open borders doesn't work in games either .
-10 kill limit and/or bann for pushing- bots
I'm not a fan of this, totally insane idea. It's supposed to be MMO; limiting your ability to fight with someone is counterproductive. I understand it was done to stop those who exploited the system but this way ruins the fun of the rest of us. Find a new solution please!
It also helps bots to keep running since not all servers are full of active players, reducing your possibility to stop the infedelis...ehm, I mean the rule-breakers. XD
Doesn't really protect newbies either.

All these issues we talked about till now, along side with players leaving, lead to enforce MCC&Bots and harming CvsCvsC and game as a whole.

Overall CvsCvcC was more fun, more user-friendly for new players, there was more cohesion in between company members and it actually was an antidote to bots.
Let's be real, every game has its bots and they will never expire entirely. Due to the PvP status enabled almoust everywhere, in this game they would have been rekt by their company. Isn't that awesome, bots cleaned up by players, no detection system needed .
And not just literally (war tag) but because no-one would have accepted these poeple in their clan, would receive no help, no events for them etc. Hell! Even an outlaw was in trouble back then, he had to write on chat to not shoot him cause of a mistake and he was going to make up for his error.

A little note: Name change also contributed to bots. Nowdays largely more than half of accounts flying on maps are AFK and due to the low active members it wouldn't make a difference to identify them. Also top Clans accept them as members so...
On the other hand during CvsCvsC era, where the change happen, this made a difference. And I didn't understand at that time why they made nick-change for free while everything else was pay-to-get it. Usually on other online games you have to ask support to change it or you can change it once/twice a year or you have up to 3 time-use nick change etc.
You might want to look at this devs and revert back.

What else...I hope everyone is well. I hope Bigpoint wont shut down the servers of Darkorbit but invest more in it. Because at the end of the day this is just business and the decision comes from the high ranks, meaning artists, coders, designers have no say in this, they are employees and don't know everything.
I say this because I had the sorrow to experience it in firsthand, going from “great year ahead” to “sorry, we close” next month and mods get mocked, verbally herassed on forum, reddit for lying to the community. The sad part was that the community menagers had no knowledge of the happening, was a decision taken from the leaders of the co.

But I'm am confident we will still be able to play this game for the next few years at least, and improvments will happen regarding some of the problems that plague this game: bugs, lag, bots.
And hopefully the downloadable Client will bring some life to the game.
Cheers!