quote:

In response to the small releases, we are a very small team. AQW is a very big team. Weapons for MQ are also more difficult to animate and design since in AQW and DF for example, all you need is the graphic of a new sword and blam. New weapon. We need a decent arm, and to animate the arm and the visual effects. Same for mechs. Hit, Miss, Sometimes Idle, Walk, Death, Melee, then a Body attack, head attack, 2 arms, and 2 shoulders. Not to mention taking the time to vectorize and color it.

It absolutely does take that long to accomplish.

At the same time though, while these releases are smaller, it's giving me time to slowly build up a bigger release of an updated intro shuttle in an attempt to keep the new players that sign up as we only get half the sign-ups of DF and AQ yet our conversion rates are just as high if not a little higher. Conversion rate means number of new players that support the game by paying.

Then there's quests and cutscenes in which our Animator and new artist are both part time and our main artist is leaving for a new game project in Artix and Thyton is also bombarded with projects which leaves me to fill in any design holes as well as animate big things like cutscenes and sometimes weapons or mechs (for instance, I shaded both weapons and animated the arm weapons because we were running behind).

It's not to say that out crew doesn't work hard it's just that we run very light.

I also have Minar but he's even more part time since he's still in school so I keep him very light with the exception of Yokai since it was during his summer.

Our bug testers are good though. I don't think there are any issues there. Just takes time to fix the bugs they find especially when you don't know the cause.

So yes. Small team = small releases = MQ. Large team = big releases = AQW.

quote:

In response to conversion rates, let's look at it this way.

MQ gets 5000 new users a day (not real numbers).

DF get around 10,000 a day.

1% of 10,000 means a lot of players spent money.

1% of 5,000 means that relatively a lot of players spent money but 1% of 5,000 is ultimately less players. I don't have the exact math formula and it's hard to figure it out manually since the payment history that I use doesn't show new customers from recurring.

Basically if we're getting half as many players as DF and AQ then we're making half as much.

Again, not real numbers. Just an example. That said, Artix is constantly surprised at the love MQ gets. He recognizes that the players of MQ are very dedicated. Our hardest issue is finding that audience.

The releases dropped significantly when Warlic had to go to team Strike Force because before that, he and I both were coding the quests and I was able to make more animations for it. However, it proved more profitable for him to move on to Strike Force which isn't a bad thing because I've seen a lot of what he's been making and it's awesome.

As for MQ, we just need to find our audience and hopefully reorganizing the Intro Shuttle will help boost the conversion rate which would solve the lack of new traffic and would possibly open the door to more crewmembers.

That said, we all work very hard on the releases. We don't mean to make them small but it's hard enough when I work for hours trying to cram as much as I can in a release only to get comments saying the releases are still super small so I decided to make several smaller releases in hopes that I could make one ridiculously long set of quests. The new planets should reflect this if we're capable.

This is probably a horrible thing to talk about on a PR level but I don't like lying to the loyal players so I try to be as honest as I can with this stuff when asked serious questions.

But now it's time for bed.

ForceConvince your friends to play.

quote:

The second problem is advertising. Seriously, how often is it you see a MechQuest ad?
Sure, there are metric tons of adverts for AQW, DF and AQ, but hardly any, if any at all.
In fact, I know that some people who, when they start out playing AE games, have absolutely no idea MQ exists.
If we could get some actual advertising out, I guarantee you the MQ fanbase would increase significantly.

quote:



I think we all understand, that less players mean less budget to get more staff members and that our current staff members aren't the problem.
All of them are doin a great job and try to provide awesome releases.

There's one problem I can see here:
DF get's more attention cause there are more players and we would get more attention too, if there were more members.
But with small releases, we just lose more and more members and the releases become smaller and smaller. There's no hope for more players.

Overall - I still like to compare DF and MQ, since... well... We only see the releases and can't talk about the income behind the games.

quote:

these are my opinions

WAY to much rares

Make the Monthly makes to 3 monthly mechs or something.
that Copy of Quibble, Every 4-5 months or something.

That way, Sc still get their Precious SC only mechs but on the other hand Lowers the rate of which Mech inventory is filled.
(Make the mech avaiable for 1 month only)

Same with Quibble guy but with the Normal inventory

and That way aswell gives the staff +2 months to think of an original Sc mech while Progressing the Story line and adding non rare mechs