Checking steamcharts.com, there is an obvious bump in people playing rF2, but no changes for R3E & AMS. However player interest in AC seems to be declining since the DX11 beta release.
Its because the wait for DX11 and VR for rF2 have been overdue for those sets of users that immediately reject rF2's inferior graphics or are now exclusively desiring VR. Mod teams also know they have to update their mods so there is high interest there. Its been posted and hyped about as much as any major release for any game on most of the gaming/simming channels. So, no not surprising at all, but thanks for the charts. It does show that frequent engagement and overdue feature upgrades will be responded to with increased overall traffic and usage. How many people bought rf2 now that it has VR and DX11? That's a question 397 can answer themselves. But I can say those won't be things that will keep people from buying the game in the future at least.
Numbers are just numbers. If you want to do an analysis you have to do it in a longer period of time and taking into account all possible variables. AC is in decline because 1 or 2 weeks ago an offer was launched with the game and all DLC 50%. This made them have their 2nd best day ever and only exceeded when they launched Nordscleiffe Laserscan. They are currently having their best daily player numbers since launch. Yes, they are on the decline ... PS: The impact of the beta DX11 on other games has been very small although the number of daily players of rF2 has practically doubled.
397 should hold back on advertising until further optimisations & new UI Them hit it hard , lots of people need to them wake up & but rfactor2 Ps one of my pals brought it last night
It's pretty much the same when AC release an update tbh, you'll see how rF2 numbers go down for a few days
In the 3 weeks before the Steam sale, AC was regularly hitting 2600 players at the daily peaks and that's not happening this week. I'm not saying correlation is causation, but I do find it suggestive because the active players in the simracing genre is such a niche. There are never very many players active, with very few recruits from outside the genre, so the sims are always stealing each other's players. I also expect the numbers to shift back as the crowd chases what's "hot & new"... e.g. consider the player shift into and out of pCARS vs. AC.
I bought rfactor2 on first beta release , I must say this is a much better & more exciting time to be either an owner or new purchaser of rfactor2 , especially if these updates keep coming daily/weekly
Well I have come back to rf2 since the dx11 release and I will be staying. I find the gfx impressive now and no longer inferior to other sims. The original rf was my go to sim and I had high expectations when rf2 was released but was highly disappointed with the look of it now I'm back for good, great work s397 I look forward to what you have instore for this SIM.
My massive frustration since release was I knew it had such amazing potential but suffered certain highly itratating flaws , Isi were top/best & delivering a physics engine capable of the very best ffb & handling properties but very bad at making an all round polished product ISI should be commended for their positive talent 397 are smart enough to recognise the potential & are patching & filling in those blanks & bringing this title to market & it could all work out real fine I hope the pay off is big for both Isi & 397'( not sure of how the partnership deal works )
I hope they (s397) dont "dumb down" physics engine to sell more. ISI build a great reputation, i think, in this department
Even before DX11 it was playable with a game pad so i don't really see any need to dumb things down. I often just test using a DS4 because getting my CSWv2 set up with my Wife and Kids around can be bothersome.
They surely know that would be a massive mistake. The loyal core of users will notice and worse still rfactor2 would suddenly become like many titles already out there this not unique Loyal users will surely buy good quality DLC in future too so they are important Re.fps performance optimisations + users running at lowest settings is the key not less physics calculations
I can tell you my story, I stopped playing AC since the release, as I wanted to finally try rF2 in VR. But it's only temporary, I'll get back to AC soon, one thing is sure though, from now on my sim time will be split between these two sims.
