Is This Game Not Very Popular?

[Admiral Raven]

The empire at war heaven games forums aren't very active either.

[gswift]

I must dispute the original premis of this thread.

 

First, slow forums don't mean poor sales of the game. The game's been out for a month now, so maybe all of the first impression comments have been made.

 

Second, I don't really see the forum as being dead. I usually see between 30 and 75 people in this forum at any one time. That's far from dead. Personally, I don't post as much as I did three weeks ago, but that's just because I don't have as much to say. I still come to read though.

 

After the 1.03 patch is released, we'll probably see a flurry of activity. After the map editor is released, there'll be an avalanch of activity.

[lukeiamyourdad]

You have to realize something. This is an RTS. RTS are stuck (for now) on the PC. The PC market is much smaller then the console market. Put those together.

There's the answer.

The RTS market has become a niche market over the years. The days of StarCraft and C&C are long gone and the genre has gone down in popularity considerably. Would this mean that the game is dead? No, it only shows the reality of today's RTS market. It shows it by the relatively low sales it will probably have (but high for RTS, low for...errr...FPS or something...)

 

It's a reality all RTS gamers have to understand. There has been quite a bit of bashing against making the RTS "more accessible" to the common man. Yet there is no way an RTS could survive if it did not cather to those who are not fanatics.

Anyway, that wasn't too much on-topic, but I just felt like saying it

 

People tend to bash WoW without reason since it has become common nowdays to bash anything that is successful.

 

I love you man The truth comes out of your mouth.

[jedi3112]

Well spoken, most people today just want the biggest and most powerfull unit to command and by such the strategy has gone out of the RTS (though EAW is quite good considering what's out today). The good thing about EAW is that it can be modded into a good RTS that will require lots of thinking.

 

For example I modded the marauder and broadside out and I think it greatly improved the game. Maybe powering down the corvette and turning the tartan into a lancer might be my next improvement.

[gswift]

According to this article: http://biz.gamedaily.com/industry/toppers/?id=12136 the game exceded Lucas Arts' highest sales projections by more than 50% in the US. I'd say that's pretty popular...

 

Also, it sounds like an expansion and/or sequel is a sure thing.

[Hobbie911]

I know four people who bought this game (outside my self). And within 2 weeks, we're all now happily playing BFME 2. Seriously, the utter chaos that is MP just totally nuked the thrill of EaW.

[Admiral Raven]

The Rome: Total War forums I used to go on were always very busy and that was a month or more after the game was released.. Not saying that I think this game is unpopular because the forums isn't as active as some others though

[DarthMuffin]

The Rome: Total War forums I used to go on were always very busy and that was a month or more after the game was released.. Not saying that I think this game is unpopular because the forums isn't as active as some others though

 

That's about a different problem : the Star Wars franchise itself.

 

With LA's past failures in the RTS genre, the prequel movies's average reviews and the realease of the LotR movie trilogy, the SW franchise has lost some feathers in the gaming industry.

 

Combine this with the fact that LA has the tendency to model SW games out of existing concepts (EaW does not have any ground-breaking features; it's basically a mix of Rebellion and the TW games) instead of truly creating a new game, and it becomes easy to understand that SW games might not be as popular as other games.

 

Let's not forget the fact that games based on movies tend to be below average in quality. That's not really the case with EaW, but it will never truly make a name for SW in the RTS pantheon.