Eternity PoE II: Deadfire Sales Analysis Thread

[Lacrymas]

65% completed PoE Act 1 compared to 33% for finishing Nashkel mines in the EE, that pretty much contradicts what you said.

Do you have a different, better source?

https://steamcommunity.com/stats/291650/achievements

Where are you getting 65% from? And the cheevo for completing Nashkel mines doesn't tell us anything because you can complete the entire rest of the game apart from main quests and not do Nashkel. You can't do that with PoE1, you can only do a very limited selection of maps before defeating Mearwald. I'm not saying people are completing the rest of the game without completing Nashkel, but I am saying that the two aren't very comparable. BG1 is a 20 year old game, PoE is a contemporary one. BG1 was good enough in its time to foster a sizeable fanbase that bought BG2, PoE1 not so much.

 

[Parabalus]

65% completed PoE Act 1 compared to 33% for finishing Nashkel mines in the EE, that pretty much contradicts what you said.

Do you have a different, better source?

https://steamcommunity.com/stats/291650/achievements

Where are you getting 65% from? And the cheevo for completing Nashkel mines doesn't tell us anything because you can complete the entire rest of the game apart from main quests and not do Nashkel. You can't do that with PoE1, you can only do a very limited selection of maps before defeating Mearwald.

I linked it in the post.

Your source for BG:EE is https://steamcommunity.com/stats/228280/achievements, it gives 14.8% for Mulahey. That's waaaay worse.

It also has 30% for leaving Candlekeep, and 26.7% for meeting Jaheria and Khalid - that makes your assertion that players completed a bunch of random maps before going for Nashkel mines very doubtful.

I'd like to see data for the original IE games but I don't think it's any better.

 

[Lacrymas]

And the point still stands, BG2 sold at least as many copies as BG1. Why would people buy the second game if they haven't even exited Candlekeep in the first? PoE2 is struggling to reach 30% of its predecessor. BG:EE really isn't comparable.

 

[Strange Fellow]

Using the EEs to prove anything wrt sales and completion rates of the Baldurs Gates is dumb.

 

[The Avatar]

I bet a lot of people that played BG:EE on Steam already played and beat the game from when it came out. I can expect some people to play it for a little bit for nostagia's sake and be like "eh" and stop.
What does completion rate for any game prove anyways? That casuals who bought the game on a sale can successfully play an rpg?

 

[Azarkon]

Vancian casting has more to do with d20 than how they implemented hit chances, armor, resistances, critical strikes and attack speeds.

Yep. Tangentially, the thing I like best about the IE games (Torment notwithstanding) is AD&D. PoE disappointed me in the way it gave magic users (and everyone else, really, but that's another matter) so many toys to play with at low levels. The thing about AD&D that few systems made specifically for games take heed of, is that it makes leveling and casting spells feel like a big deal. When you only have the one fireball until you rest again, casting it is a much more significant decision, and the effect of the spell is likewise much more significant. I know, this has been said a million times already... but not by me!

I'll also add that I think it's a damn shame that newer games don't treat levels as an in-universe commodity that you have to pay for anymore. Makes it feel a lot more special when you do make a level, and could even somewhat curb the speed at which the economy is broken in every RPG ever.

At the same time, it seemed very stupid that a trained wizard used a sling shot 99% of the times because he's got one magic missile a day. This worked in pen and paper because you could be flexible about rests, as a game master, but in a computer game, this either led to infinite rests or a restricted rest system in which wizards felt like garbage for the first few levels, which in Dungeons and Dragons, could last a long time.

Later editions of Dungeons and Dragons would address this problem by adding cantrips. In fifth edition, cantrips are unlimited use, so wizards always had a small amount of magic to fall back on and never had to use weapons. I think the bigger crime in Pillars of Eternity's design is not that it tried to make the low level game more exciting for wizards, but that its magic system as a whole is not fun.

I do agree that you need to make sure, in a party game, that you don't overwhelm the player with abilities, and I blame the talents system in Pillars of Eternity for that, but there was an issue with Dungeons and Dragons's magic system at low levels that needed to be addressed.

 

[Lacrymas]

Wizards are pretty badass and versatile in PoE, though. Not as overpowered as the IE games, but they still have a variety of toys to work with. Pull of Eora, Kalakoth's Minor Blights (a personal favorite), the summoned weapons, Dimensional Shift, Maura's Writhing Tentacles, Citzal's Martial Power, Substantial Phantom etc. I am mostly disappointed in the Druid and their spell selection, very one-dimensional and uninteresting class. Maybe a build around Rot Skulls can be interesting in PoE2, though.

What does completion rate for any game prove anyways? That casuals who bought the game on a sale can successfully play an rpg?

It's not completion rates for the entire game, it's completion rates for the first few hours. Meaning the game can't hold the attention of the majority of people who play it for a few hours. This isn't really disputable, we are trying to understand why that is.

 

[Strange Fellow]

At the same time, it seemed very stupid that a trained wizard used a sling shot 99% of the times because he's got one magic missile a day. This worked in pen and paper because you could be flexible about rests, as a game master, but in a computer game, this either led to infinite rests or a restricted rest system in which wizards felt like garbage for the first few levels, which in Dungeons and Dragons, could last a long time.

This is why I say that IE and AD&D was a poor fit. I've said it before, but the only truly implementation of Vancian is a dungeon + resting place environment a la Wizardry 1. Obviously, you can't restrict every RPG to this template, but there you go.

I never thought that wizards were useless in low level AD&D in CRPGs however, just situational. That Sleep spell will win you an encounter, it's up to you to assess whether your fighters can handle it by themselves or if you need to use it. In fact, I think the obsession with giving everyone something to do every "turn" in a party based game did a lot of harm to PoE.

 

[Bester]

At a price of $45, that's 45x280.000 = 12.600.000.

The fuck is wrong with you? You sold a title on steam and yet you're still valuing a game at $45. Are you retarded or what?

Divide it by 2 to get a realistic number after sales and poor currencies. Moron.

Calm the fuck down. Jesus, you must have some mental disorder if you are flipping out like an idiot just because I counted with the US price. I just did a very basic calculation for the sales, and not my PhD on macroeconomy.

You're right, I'm sorry J_C, didn't want to hurt your feelings, I know you're a touchy guy. I got on a keto diet yesterday. I'll be irritated like a chick on rags, I'll have brain fog and my body will be weak for the entire duration of the keto flu (1+ week). I can barely work and I get a lot of stupid irritating shit from colleagues. I don't know if I can last.

 

[fantadomat]

Parabalus your post are becoming retarded mate,take a brake. You can't compare the completion rates of a game that came out 20 years ago to that of games that just came out. You point is kind of paradoxical,it is because of BG 1&2 that PoE and Beamdog exits after all. Obsidian did market PoE as a BG successor,if the game was that unpopular as you say,then PoE wouldn't have sold that many copies. From where does the notion that less people played/completed BG is a mystery to me. The game was played enough for 20 years to have a big fallowing and tons of mods,while PoE is forgotten by most people. Even here we don't talk that much about Deadfire two months after release,in a year time it will be a spec of dust.

 

[Safav Hamon]

Both games are visually incomprehensible, it's just that most us have years of experience in the genre so we can navigate the clusterfuck easily and beat non-boss encounters with barely any pausing.

Couple of times I stumbled upon some randoms streaming PoE1 and PoE2 and jesus fucking christ it's a pain to watch. People pausing every milisecond and mouth-breathing for minutes about what is going on, who is attacking who, where is the damage coming from, I can feel it in the air tonight oh lord.

Does no one realize that you can slow down time during combat?

 

[Roguey]

Are you sure she was laid off and didn't just quit?

She didn't react like a person quitting on her private twitter account.

 

[fantadomat]

Are you sure she was laid off and didn't just quit?

She didn't react like a person quitting on her private twitter account.

Any pictures of it?

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Both games are visually incomprehensible, it's just that most us have years of experience in the genre so we can navigate the clusterfuck easily and beat non-boss encounters with barely any pausing.

Couple of times I stumbled upon some randoms streaming PoE1 and PoE2 and jesus fucking christ it's a pain to watch. People pausing every milisecond and mouth-breathing for minutes about what is going on, who is attacking who, where is the damage coming from, I can feel it in the air tonight oh lord.

Does no one realize that you can slow down time during combat?

Slowing or pausing doesn't magically make the presentation more clear, it just gives you more time to figure out what's happening.

 

[Roguey]

Any pictures of it?

I'm unwilling to share unfortunately.

 

[Metal Hurlant]

65% completed PoE Act 1 compared to 33% for finishing Nashkel mines in the EE, that pretty much contradicts what you said.

Do you have a different, better source?

https://steamcommunity.com/stats/291650/achievements

Where are you getting 65% from? And the cheevo for completing Nashkel mines doesn't tell us anything because you can complete the entire rest of the game apart from main quests and not do Nashkel. You can't do that with PoE1, you can only do a very limited selection of maps before defeating Mearwald.

I linked it in the post.

Your source for BG:EE is https://steamcommunity.com/stats/228280/achievements, it gives 14.8% for Mulahey. That's waaaay worse.

It also has 30% for leaving Candlekeep, and 26.7% for meeting Jaheria and Khalid - that makes your assertion that players completed a bunch of random maps before going for Nashkel mines very doubtful.

I'd like to see data for the original IE games but I don't think it's any better.

Steam achievements for BG:EE came out (2016) four years after it was released (2012). I'd assume many people played and possibly finished BG:EE when it came out but can't be bothered going back and completing it again for the achievements. However, that's not the case with PoE when achievements were there on release.

 

[Roguey]

Just look at hours played.
BG:EE Playtime total: 23:19 (average) 04:19 (median)
BG2: Playtime total: 17:21 (average) 03:46 (median)
PoE: Playtime total: 28:08 (average) 08:29 (median)
Deadfire: Playtime total: 34:11 (average) 26:43 (median)

and for good measure
IWD Playtime total: 08:03 (average) 05:29 (median) (lol)
PST Playtime total: 10:55 (average) 02:24 (median)


See what's delightful here is that the people who do buy Deadfire are superfans. They've been sticking with it far longer than any of the others.

Moreover, Pillars 1's median and average is higher than both BGs.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

I'm not sure if there's any insight to be gained from comparing Steam data between game that came out 20 years ago and another franchise that is fresh and new.

Ie. I must have beaten both Fallout 1&2 at least 5 times, but if according to Steam data I abandoned both games 3 minutes in and never touched them again.

 

[Roguey]

I'm not sure if there's any insight to be gained from comparing Steam data between game that came out 20 years ago and another franchise that is fresh and new.

Ie. I must have beaten both Fallout 1&2 at least 5 times, but if according to Steam data I abandoned both games 3 minutes in and never touched them again.

I doubt the majority of buyers are people purchasing an additional copy of something they already own or owned.

 

[HoboForEternity]

It isn't "pretty good" when everything is happening in microsecond intervals and there isn't even a filter. Even then, you aren't looking at the combat log the entire combat to know what is going on and you really can't, you have to pause constantly, read the combat log, unpause, pause, read the combat log etc. How is this a clear and intuitive system? The UI in general being terrible at conveying any kind of useful information doesn't help.

this isnt exclusive to poe. This is all retatardation suffered by most if not all rtwp

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

I'm not sure if there's any insight to be gained from comparing Steam data between game that came out 20 years ago and another franchise that is fresh and new.

Ie. I must have beaten both Fallout 1&2 at least 5 times, but if according to Steam data I abandoned both games 3 minutes in and never touched them again.

I doubt the majority of buyers are people purchasing an additional copy of something they already own or owned.

Majority of buyers maybe not. But there's certainly a lot of people who own physical edition and bought digital edition just for convenience, and there's others who pirated BG back in a day and only bought it now to atone for their sins with no intention of actually playing it.

Heck I have a boxed BG but I can't actually play it because I don't have optical drive.

 

[Quillon]

To react less, lower the difficulty. Or react to everything every microsecond then complain about needing to do that or about game being too easy and shit.

 

[fantadomat]

I'm not sure if there's any insight to be gained from comparing Steam data between game that came out 20 years ago and another franchise that is fresh and new.

Ie. I must have beaten both Fallout 1&2 at least 5 times, but if according to Steam data I abandoned both games 3 minutes in and never touched them again.

I doubt the majority of buyers are people purchasing an additional copy of something they already own or owned.

Who here doesn't own a digital copy of BG ? Most people that bought the originals also bought the digital.

 

[AwesomeButton]

bought the originals

 

[fantadomat]

AwesomeButton please don't pretend that you bought the original game ,as if there was an option to do it back in the day in Easter Europa. Fuck now that i think about it,i did buy the fucking game. It was a four disk copies written with marker "Baldur's gate 2" on them,found it while browsing the pirate market on Slaveikov,it costed the equivalent of 1 euro per disk back them whole two bottles of good vodka. Ah the good old times.