The MMO shooter Planetside 2 is in a results crisis. This is stated by Jens Andersen, the new Executive Creative Director of the studio.
Recently, the head behind DC Universe Online was promoted to Executive Creative Director of Daybreak Game Company, thus becoming the chief creative of the whole studio. He has now expressed himself about the overall situation of the online shooter “Planetside 2” in an AMA on reddit and found clear words.
Planetside 2 is really having problems. Not only on the PlayStation 4 but also on the PC. They are now urgently looking for ways to change this and hope that the fans are open-minded. They need to find ways to generate more revenue, more money, with Planetside 2 if it is to have better prospects for the future.
That sounds like they’re tightening the screws in the cash shop and are already asking for understanding from the fans.
Planetside 2 is too intimidating, loses too many players too early, makes too little money
The game needs improvements in various areas. One of the problems is that too many new players are lost between BR 9 and 11, Andersen states in the Q&A. This needs to change. Planetside 2 is a complicated game and can seem intimidating.
In the short term, they will need to create opportunities to generate more money. This also means creating “more attractive opportunities” for players to spend money in Planetside 2.
Mein MMO says: Even at the turn of the year, the then president of the studio, John Smedley, addressed the difficulties with Planetside 2. The “payment model” of Planetside 2 likely leads to players simply spending too little money in the Free2Play MMO. Announcements to make the cash shop more attractive had already triggered protests.
At that time, Smedley stated that Planetside 2 had only recently started generating profit. The port to PlayStation 4 in 2015, which took a lot of time, seems to have worsened this situation rather than improved it. A planned port to Xbox One also seems to be a bad idea in this light. Clearly, the game needs a fundamental overhaul.
From the outside, it seems that Planetside 2 has found a small but enthusiastic fanbase that enjoys the cumbersome game mechanics and the steep learning curve. But this seems insufficient to ensure the game’s development. It appears that – like many other games – they will rely on higher accessibility and greater “attractiveness” of the cash shop. This is generally not well received by core fans.
