No restart, how about a second game?

[Cronester]

Hello,

As some of you might probably know, I am a returning player. Earlier I mentionned it might be a good idea to reset. I do understand that the players of very old characters do not agree. Other text based games attract new and old players by frequently starting new servers. usually this increases the player base. How about Cantr III?

Immediately I would have a couple questions:

1. How much effort does it take to create a new map?
2. How much effort does it take to redistribute resources in stead of a new map?
3. What would it cost to run a second game?
4. Did the owner(s) set a minimum amount of players?
5. Any more questions I should ask?

Please take time to answer the poll. If you are in contact with ex-players, they might like to answer this poll too.

Kind regards,
Cronester

[hyrle]

If I'm honest, I don't see the point of a reset. Approximately 80% of the game's landmass is unsettled and highly undeveloped, so for someone wanting the experience of having to struggle and build things from scratch, there's plenty of ways to have a reset-like experience. Have your character wander off from their starting town and try to scrap their way out in the wilderness. Get some like-minded friends together and decide you want to start your own town. If your character is on an established island and you don't want to encounter people who would "help you out", have your character(s) sail off into a less populated area of the game. It's a tough road (especially for those new to the game), but I've done it with several characters and it can be rewarding.

[Cronester]

I understand you have your ideas, as I have mine. That you do not understand mine does not mean mine are weird or not logic. It just means you are not trying to see my point of view. But since it's a game fairly easy to duplicate, we could have both or one of us will leave. Which option, in your opinion, is better for the game: both or (one) player(s) that leave(s)?

The setup of the game does not let you spawn in these empty area's. To start a fresh game you do not only need a town without people. You need an isolated part of the world where new people will spawn, but noone was or is to come any time soon. The big island which is supposed to be rather empty is not, travel there and you will find cities, roads wild bikes and more. A good part is inhabited, an even larger part is known. The uninhabited part of the island has large areas with roughly the same resources. Yes, I did send a few characters to that island, some of them by accident, and took the time to visit a couple places with them.

What you are suggesting is to spawn a character, fix food for 10 years, build a ship and sail around in the hope to find a "large" uninhabited island with at least most of the necessary resources on a part of the world map where noone searches. Then hopefully more will spawn at your feet and the players of those characters do not bring their pirates, traders and other well established characters to that new place. This would take what 10 Cantr years, 200 days, after which the game finally starts? You must be kidding.

Also my hope is to find a group of players interested in playing the game and not mistake the (survival) game for adult entertainment.

But I noticed you didn't vote yet?

[sherman]

I would say I would play both since I have invested time on my chars and losing them would kinda suck now. But as it stands out... Lack of people is problem on Cantr II, you could do so much more with more people. Reset wouldn't really fix that. I like survival part too (But not getting killed by scarabs, yes I have been killed by one as a noob ) and new game would open new possibilities to be first on something. Or establishing new town out of nowhere on rich area.

Also Fu is really desolated, though.. you can find random bikes and even cars. And abandoned towns. But fresh game... Would offer much more, building towns out of nowhere, see new worlds etc.

[ObsessedWithCats]

Approximately 80% of the game's landmass is unsettled and highly undeveloped

Which speaks for how much too big the current world is for the current playerbase, at least.

I was thinking a while ago, what would it be like if players could create mini-worlds to play Cantr in, with the rules for each world depending on its creator. It'd be great to have a game with Cantr's mechanics that could be played with your friends, or played on different map sizes, or with different resource distributions.

[Marian]

But since it's a game fairly easy to duplicate,

Then why take the time to make this thread. Just make the new game for you and your friends and I'm sure other players will come.

I mean, it's easy, right?

[ObsessedWithCats]

My actual answer I guess is that I'd probably play both if the new one were a smaller map and reasonably populated, and just the current if the new one were large.

It looks like your goal with this is solely to create a situation that would allow you a character who can build from the ground up, but I think desire based spawning would be a better means to that end. I think some of the major sleepiness problems could be knocked down with a very cleverly implemented second world but that's something that'd need a lot more thought than this.

[hyrle]

I understand you have your ideas, as I have mine. That you do not understand mine does not mean mine are weird or not logic. It just means you are not trying to see my point of view. But since it's a game fairly easy to duplicate, we could have both or one of us will leave. Which option, in your opinion, is better for the game: both or (one) player(s) that leave(s)?

The setup of the game does not let you spawn in these empty area's. To start a fresh game you do not only need a town without people. You need an isolated part of the world where new people will spawn, but noone was or is to come any time soon. The big island which is supposed to be rather empty is not, travel there and you will find cities, roads wild bikes and more. A good part is inhabited, an even larger part is known. The uninhabited part of the island has large areas with roughly the same resources. Yes, I did send a few characters to that island, some of them by accident, and took the time to visit a couple places with them.

What you are suggesting is to spawn a character, fix food for 10 years, build a ship and sail around in the hope to find a "large" uninhabited island with at least most of the necessary resources on a part of the world map where noone searches. Then hopefully more will spawn at your feet and the players of those characters do not bring their pirates, traders and other well established characters to that new place. This would take what 10 Cantr years, 200 days, after which the game finally starts? You must be kidding.

Also my hope is to find a group of players interested in playing the game and not mistake the (survival) game for adult entertainment.

But I noticed you didn't vote yet?

Let me clarify - I understand your idea, and I do get it - a fresh world would give new players joining today the ability to explore the world, make new maps, and figure out everything from scratch like the early population of Cantr had to do. I admit that joining the game as late as I did meant I missed out on doing that in the game's formative years. There's very little left of Cantr that's relatively unexplored, and so I do get the sense that having a fresh game would allow for that exploration part - so I do see why you have a desire to have a fresh new Cantr experience with exploration at the heart. And if we can have both Cantrs without much trouble, it would be nice.

However, what I suggested is actually something I was able to do with a character on a remote island. My character and a group of other similarly-aged ones decided to leave our spawn town with very little and start our own town. It didn't take 10 years... we just up and did it, and we hunted and farmed for and cooked food along the way. But I admit that we did have maps and information, so we did know where to get what we wanted and needed. Having a fresh game would bring an element of exploration of the unknown into it that I agree would be refreshing.

I also do agree that it would be nice to have an option to spawn randomly in an empty spot and essentially play Cantr as a survival game from day 1 with a character. I've voted positively on the suggestion for it in the past.

What might be interesting is to take your idea and Obsessed's idea... maybe create a premium option where a paying player can create a Cantr mini-world and set the rules, pick the resources, etc... and allow one character per player to join such a mini-world with those rules in place. I suspect that would not be an easy idea to implement, but it would be a possible way to generate revenue for the game.

[Cronester]

But since it's a game fairly easy to duplicate,

Then why take the time to make this thread. Just make the new game for you and your friends and I'm sure other players will come.

I mean, it's easy, right?

ROFL you have a serious issue.

I have no intention to recreate the game. I would consider that stealing. But the current owner(s) could just copy (duplicate) the game. It's not like we are dealing with a modern shooter here. With an empty player related database this game is probably not 8GB in size.

Yes, choose where you spawn a character would be an option. But that would mean pick a location on a map. Soon everyone will be alone or playing with the same players all the time. Which is now the case in whatever is left of the Dutch area.

I would, with that in mind, limit the languages to 2 maybe 3.

Creating small worlds with friends is definately a valid idea, although the overall game would still die and what is left are small groups of friends playing together till it gets boring meeting the same players over and over again. By the way, isn't that happening already, friends meeting up in cantr?

[Crownless]

I would, with that in mind, limit the languages to 2 maybe 3.

[Cronester]

19 active players on the forum?

[Moonflame]

19 active players on the forum?

Please can you add an option for "I'd play neither"?

If a Cantr III appeared and a load of players started dividing their time between II and III, I don't think I'd maintain the motivation to play either. Getting new players is great, but I think attracting them in the way you're saying will result in the same proportion of new players leaving before their characters hit 30 as we get now. We'll be eventually left again with a minority of old characters who own resources. Then someone will come along and say "Cantr IV !?" We'd attract more players and we'd lose more players and there would overall at any one time be more players in the initial stages of learning how to play Cantr, noobing out and then giving up.

It sounds like you want everyone to start again, afresh, on a level playing field. I can see the attraction to that, especially from the perspective of a returning player. However, in my opinion that's just not how Cantr works. There's a long stretching history to become part of and after a bunch of RL years the novelty of short-term things wears off a bit, you can't stay just for the short-term. That's what it looks like to me anyway, and my characters aren't even old-old! If you'll only enjoy the game when there's some sort of reset where everyone starts again from scratch, I don't think you're going to find what you're looking for here. Stick it out with us instead. Even if there's a situation where a town is quiet and boring and people don't respond, keep putting in and you will get back. Starting Cantr III isn't going to eliminate those situations, everyone still has real life to play too.

[Rmak]

I cannot see there being the human resource available or the motivation to have a reset\new environment.

[iavatus]

The game is old, creaky, clunky, with weird, weird things and a fairly woeful interface. Why would I willingly sign up for that? There's plenty of muds, or MMO's, or other options if a levelled playing field is what's wanted. Cantr has history. Weird history, but that's what you get from a decade of people appearing and disappearing.

E: And shouldn't this be in suggestions, not in the more chitchat area?

[Marian]

But since it's a game fairly easy to duplicate,

Then why take the time to make this thread. Just make the new game for you and your friends and I'm sure other players will come.

I mean, it's easy, right?

ROFL you have a serious issue.

I have no intention to recreate the game. I would consider that stealing. But the current owner(s) could just copy (duplicate) the game. It's not like we are dealing with a modern shooter here. With an empty player related database this game is probably not 8GB in size.

Yes, choose where you spawn a character would be an option. But that would mean pick a location on a map. Soon everyone will be alone or playing with the same players all the time. Which is now the case in whatever is left of the Dutch area.

I would, with that in mind, limit the languages to 2 maybe 3.

Creating small worlds with friends is definately a valid idea, although the overall game would still die and what is left are small groups of friends playing together till it gets boring meeting the same players over and over again. By the way, isn't that happening already, friends meeting up in cantr?

So basically what you're saying is you have no idea what you're talking about.

I don't know what other conclusion to draw when right from the get go you are completely, factually wrong on your most basic points. 'Cantr is easy to duplicate, just recreate the map and cut out the languages of a large portion of the player base, and success!' Seriously, did you even bother to find out who the owner if, or what the situation is there, or read any previous topics on the subject before stating that as a fact and basing your entire argument on them?

Of course, so far any attempts people make to point out why so far have been met with hostility, so I'm honestly not even sure why I ever bothered to respond.

It's all well and good to talk about a reset or what might be different if there were ever a Cantr 3, but presenting every opinion you have as fact and dismissing everyone else's, along with reality itself, isn't going to accomplish anything or lead to any kind of discussion any one can have in good faith.