New Dark Orbit in 2022 (not a private server)

Hello Dark Orbit community,

I think all here will agree that Dark Orbit has aged very badly and the game quality is far from the standards of what you would expect a modern game to be.
If it is clear that dark orbit is disappointing, what is not clear is what/how a dark orbit like game could be satisfying in 2022 ? And it's to answer that question I created this post.

Regarding that issue, I decided last year to create Space Age, I game that was supposed to reproduce the old school Dark Orbit and evolve in the direction the community likes without doing the mistakes bigpoint did.
First problem was that the community was split between those that (A) wanted the game to stay exactly like dark orbit, and (B) those that wanted the game to evolve beyond that. Majority of the community was part of (A), but they were also the firsts to get bored when the nostalgia effect faded away : they realized then that they were playing the exact same game they hated. Players in (B) were ready to see the game evolve, but their vision of how the game could evolve didn't go further than revisiting features that already existed in Dark Orbit, they wanted to stick to what they knew.

I managed to add a few novel features to Space Age that were mostly accepted by the community and have every good effects on the game. But a few novel features are not enough for a 2008 game to be broadly accepted in 2022, the core concept of dark orbit is outdated. Let me explain :

The core game mechanics are very minimalist, it's basically just click + ctrl.
PvE is very repetitive and boring.
PvP is also very repetitive and boring, player with the best equipment always wins. In group fights the biggest group wins. PvP is interesting only when same group size and same equipment: and even in that case it becomes very repetitive and boring.
Anybody introduced to dark orbit/space age in 2022 will merely play 5min, get very bored and quit. Please tell me if I am wrong.

So that said, I would like to have your opinion about this ? What do you think ? Do you Agree ? How can a top down multiplayer space shooter be good in 2022 ? What is your vision of the ideal game ?

EDIT: I've been working on a new game with the goal of being way better than dark orbit in many ways, let me know what you think.

You should just move on and work on interesting project, sadly darkorbit is dead, it's time to turn the page, even though you make a perfect server as you said this will get boring at the end, "flash" game as ended and new engine game are here, a game made with UR4/5 would be way more profitable for your side and enjoyable for our side. I understand the feeling about the nostaglia building "our perfect vision of darkorbit" i even tried doing it myself too but in the end that was pointless and too much wasting time for nothing. If you have the knowledge and the capacity as you claim just work for a good company or create your own game. Anyway just to say don't waste your time for this shit game and start doing amazing things.

If you can make it to be like darkorbit 2011-2014 without spartan and prometheus,I can say you will have a huge amount of players. Everyone wants that version of darkorbit in a private server. I mean with gates upgrades,hercules havoc lf4 etc.

I mention its just an opinion.

Quote:

Originally Posted by loveditoi You should just move on and work on interesting project, sadly darkorbit is dead, it's time to turn the page, even though you make a perfect server as you said this will get boring at the end, "flash" game as ended and new engine game are here, a game made with UR4/5 would be way more profitable for your side and enjoyable for our side. I understand the feeling about the nostaglia building "our perfect vision of darkorbit" i even tried doing it myself too but in the end that was pointless and too much wasting time for nothing. If you have the knowledge and the capacity as you claim just work for a good company or create your own game. Anyway just to say don't waste your time for this shit game and start doing amazing things.

I agree, I have to move on and make my own game.
But I have the feeling that no game has ever replaced dark orbit, that there is still room for a game for retired dark orbit players. So the last thing I can do at least before moving on is ask the community if they want a new game ? A better game ? Or they just don't care anymore ? And also learn from them and get feedback to not redo the same mistakes on my new game.

By the way I am already working on a prototype, here's a preview if you're interested :
EDIT:

Quote:

Originally Posted by gueuledange I agree, I have to move on and make my own game. But I have the feeling that no game has ever replaced dark orbit, that there is still room for a game for retired dark orbit players. So the last thing I can do at least before moving on is ask the community if they want a new game ? A better game ? Or they just don't care anymore ? And also learn from them and get feedback to not redo the same mistakes on my new game. By the way I am already working on a prototype, here's a preview if you're interested : [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]

That looks promising, waiting for more, hope to see a good preview

Been thinking about the same question you are right now but ultimately decided not to pursue this idea (although i basically had a prototype html5 engine ready), i think we can agree that everyone here on epvpers loves the early 2010s DO (now dont get me wrong, pre 2010s DO was great, i still remember farming in my OG yamato lmao), but the last time the game was any good was probably 2015-2016? And even that might be stretching it (no offense towards people who still enjoy(ed) DO past these years). Lot of things changed in gaming since then, most people either switched to playing "real life" or found other games to play.

My point? Yes everyone here would try out the new DO, probably including me :D, but what do you do afterwards? How do you approach new players that have never played DO, while also retaining the veterans of the original DO? That is a very difficult question to solve.

Conclusion, i personally do not think you can make a top down space shooter like DO mass-popular in 2021(soon 2022). Remember, DO blew up thanks to utilizing back then relatively new engine flash (you will be missed), while the gaming market was entirely different back then (oh man and the DO ads were so cool to me as a child lmao).

NOTE: This is just my opinion that i wanted to share, please do not stone me to death.

Either way, good luck to you with your project, i am impressed by what the community can sometimes achieve, and so i hope yours project will impress me the next :)

in fact it's true, the best time for me was from 2010 to 2014, I think it was a lot of fun at least in pvp with the implementation of the bases it was something that kept you hooked on the game, there were no things that would saturate the game unnecessarily, I played uberorbit for a long time, but it took quite a few patches to fix bugs, which they never did and the bad also was that they rebooted the server and I had to start from 0, it was annoying, In fact, in my 20 years I have never played on a server private that is stable in those years of the game (2011 - 2014) uberorbitv2, uberorbitv3, I remember that oneultimate also had a PVE and PVP server configured in the year 2011 - 2014. All the servers had the same errors as if it were a bad copy and they were never fixed, but we still really enjoyed ourselves.

Why don't you make a clone which starts with the 2009 model with the oldest hud and then you reproduce all the upgrades that bigpoint did through the years ?

For example, the game starts with the oldest HUD and then after some months you change to 2010 HUD, after some time you add skilltree, then enforcer and bastion, then special designs, then LF4...

The main idea is just like that, you make a game which is faded to revive the old times and all
it's evolution. Tho for personal i'd say that you should better stop at 2014 xD before 3D graphics and 3D drone formations, that if you consider that option :P.

I still feel that the nostalgia is way too big for players to leave DO graphics to play a similar game like war universe, space age (original hud) or warp of space, that is why this kind of games doesn't evolve too much, ppl get literally bored of it way too fast.

I think not mostly but ALL the private servers and clones from DO
never tried the best to bring new players, not even DO itself, i mean,
when did you ever seen a ads about DO/p-server/clone anywhere?

The answer is simple, this community is only trying to bring players who
already played darkorbit somewhen, but mostly of these players already got
old enough and filled it's life with more important or more funny bussiness.

My thoughts are that the recipe to make a good clone or private server is to
make the best use of adversiments and bring as many old as new players into
the game. But for that you will need money, and for mostly of the developers,
to make money you must make the game P2W but that isn't true.

First if you search for any game on google play or app store and you watch their
comments, you will see that mostly of the game are a bunch of failures because
everybody complains about P2W features: "We can't compete with players who
are using money, cuz their equipment or their tool is way too OP", so they just
abandon it. So i am 100% right when i say people leave the games mostly of P2W
features.

To find a solution we must look back to the past, the golden decade, when
mostly of the awesome games went famous, as for me in the age i became
addicted to DO, DDTANK, HABBOO, TRANSFORMICE. I am sure some of you
ever heard about one of this games, maybe even "DO" :kappa:

When i went into anywhere in the internet, a online game site, or even youtube
i would find a ADS about one of this games, literally they were everywhere, this is
how i got to know them and guess what... in that time, noone of them was P2W, for
my sight atleast.

How to solve the problems with P-Servers/DO-clones then ? They need to adversificate
and to bring money to their owners. Its not too simple but there are many ways to make it.
For example, in the early game ppl would not get bothered by watching ADS in return of some
Extra Energies, Ammo, or even time reduce of skylab like DO used to do (they did bad :P).
Instead of letting everyone buy uridium and grown UFE in one day while F2P players take ages,
remove the uridium from shop, add a packet where you pay X and receive Y uridium weekly/monthly.
Add cosmetic stuffs which F2P players may be able to get over time but for P2W players to buy in
the shop. Premium was the worst thing DO brough to the game due to the 2nd and 3rd quickslot bar,
F2P players cannot afford the many features DO brough into the game while doing PvP against P2W
players.

Do you still remember how tutorial used to be back in the time ? It was awesome for newcomers, DO
removed it. When you play DO you think just like that, they remove good stuff and replace with shitty stuff,
am i wrong ? Do you remember when even the log in page used to be awesome?

Actual p-servers and clone staffs doesn't have enough ambition! They think
"Oh my game have 50 players online so its all good". Little man, go beyond that, bring,
thousands, alot of ppl, make a interesting tuto, a awesome ADS video and banner and leave it
everywhere in the internet. ppl need to be surprised by a good game introduction which will soon
make them addicted but DO never had it and nobody was ever ambitious enough to make it come true.

Also, do not work alone, i know it's hard to find someone who you may trust, but you must find a solution
and work as a team. As a movie teached me and i don't mean to offend anybody here xD... "Apes alone, weak.
Apes together, strong!".

Quote:

Originally Posted by Akame_Ga_Kill Why don't you make a clone which starts with the 2009 model with the oldest hud and then you reproduce all the upgrades that bigpoint did through the years ? For example, the game starts with the oldest HUD and then after some months you change to 2010 HUD, after some time you add skilltree, then enforcer and bastion, then special designs, then LF4... The main idea is just like that, you make a game which is faded to revive the old times and all it's evolution. Tho for personal i'd say that you should better stop at 2014 xD before 3D graphics and 3D drone formations, that if you consider that option :P. I still feel that the nostalgia is way too big for players to leave DO graphics to play a similar game like war universe, space age (original hud) or warp of space, that is why this kind of games doesn't evolve too much, ppl get literally bored of it way too fast. I think not mostly but ALL the private servers and clones from DO never tried the best to bring new players, not even DO itself, i mean, when did you ever seen a ads about DO/p-server/clone anywhere? The answer is simple, this community is only trying to bring players who already played darkorbit somewhen, but mostly of these players already got old enough and filled it's life with more important or more funny bussiness. My thoughts are that the recipe to make a good clone or private server is to make the best use of adversiments and bring as many old as new players into the game. But for that you will need money, and for mostly of the developers, to make money you must make the game P2W but that isn't true. First if you search for any game on google play or app store and you watch their comments, you will see that mostly of the game are a bunch of failures because everybody complains about P2W features: "We can't compete with players who are using money, cuz their equipment or their tool is way too OP", so they just abandon it. So i am 100% right when i say people leave the games mostly of P2W features. To find a solution we must look back to the past, the golden decade, when mostly of the awesome games went famous, as for me in the age i became addicted to DO, DDTANK, HABBOO, TRANSFORMICE. I am sure some of you ever heard about one of this games, maybe even "DO" :kappa: When i went into anywhere in the internet, a online game site, or even youtube i would find a ADS about one of this games, literally they were everywhere, this is how i got to know them and guess what... in that time, noone of them was P2W, for my sight atleast. How to solve the problems with P-Servers/DO-clones then ? They need to adversificate and to bring money to their owners. Its not too simple but there are many ways to make it. For example, in the early game ppl would not get bothered by watching ADS in return of some Extra Energies, Ammo, or even time reduce of skylab like DO used to do (they did bad :P). Instead of letting everyone buy uridium and grown UFE in one day while F2P players take ages, remove the uridium from shop, add a packet where you pay X and receive Y uridium weekly/monthly. Add cosmetic stuffs which F2P players may be able to get over time but for P2W players to buy in the shop. Premium was the worst thing DO brough to the game due to the 2nd and 3rd quickslot bar, F2P players cannot afford the many features DO brough into the game while doing PvP against P2W players. Do you still remember how tutorial used to be back in the time ? It was awesome for newcomers, DO removed it. When you play DO you think just like that, they remove good stuff and replace with shitty stuff, am i wrong ? Do you remember when even the log in page used to be awesome? Actual p-servers and clone staffs doesn't have enough ambition! They think "Oh my game have 50 players online so its all good". Little man, go beyond that, bring, thousands, alot of ppl, make a interesting tuto, a awesome ADS video and banner and leave it everywhere in the internet. ppl need to be surprised by a good game introduction which will soon make them addicted but DO never had it and nobody was ever ambitious enough to make it come true. Also, do not work alone, i know it's hard to find someone who you may trust, but you must find a solution and work as a team. As a movie teached me and i don't mean to offend anybody here xD... "Apes alone, weak. Apes together, strong!".

even I would be willing to help the developer financially,

Quote:

Originally Posted by Akame_Ga_Kill Why don't you make a clone which starts with the 2009 model with the oldest hud and then you reproduce all the upgrades that bigpoint did through the years ? For example, the game starts with the oldest HUD and then after some months you change to 2010 HUD, after some time you add skilltree, then enforcer and bastion, then special designs, then LF4... The main idea is just like that, you make a game which is faded to revive the old times and all it's evolution. Tho for personal i'd say that you should better stop at 2014 xD before 3D graphics and 3D drone formations, that if you consider that option :P. I still feel that the nostalgia is way too big for players to leave DO graphics to play a similar game like war universe, space age (original hud) or warp of space, that is why this kind of games doesn't evolve too much, ppl get literally bored of it way too fast. I think not mostly but ALL the private servers and clones from DO never tried the best to bring new players, not even DO itself, i mean, when did you ever seen a ads about DO/p-server/clone anywhere? The answer is simple, this community is only trying to bring players who already played darkorbit somewhen, but mostly of these players already got old enough and filled it's life with more important or more funny bussiness. My thoughts are that the recipe to make a good clone or private server is to make the best use of adversiments and bring as many old as new players into the game. But for that you will need money, and for mostly of the developers, to make money you must make the game P2W but that isn't true. First if you search for any game on google play or app store and you watch their comments, you will see that mostly of the game are a bunch of failures because everybody complains about P2W features: "We can't compete with players who are using money, cuz their equipment or their tool is way too OP", so they just abandon it. So i am 100% right when i say people leave the games mostly of P2W features. To find a solution we must look back to the past, the golden decade, when mostly of the awesome games went famous, as for me in the age i became addicted to DO, DDTANK, HABBOO, TRANSFORMICE. I am sure some of you ever heard about one of this games, maybe even "DO" :kappa: When i went into anywhere in the internet, a online game site, or even youtube i would find a ADS about one of this games, literally they were everywhere, this is how i got to know them and guess what... in that time, noone of them was P2W, for my sight atleast. How to solve the problems with P-Servers/DO-clones then ? They need to adversificate and to bring money to their owners. Its not too simple but there are many ways to make it. For example, in the early game ppl would not get bothered by watching ADS in return of some Extra Energies, Ammo, or even time reduce of skylab like DO used to do (they did bad :P). Instead of letting everyone buy uridium and grown UFE in one day while F2P players take ages, remove the uridium from shop, add a packet where you pay X and receive Y uridium weekly/monthly. Add cosmetic stuffs which F2P players may be able to get over time but for P2W players to buy in the shop. Premium was the worst thing DO brough to the game due to the 2nd and 3rd quickslot bar, F2P players cannot afford the many features DO brough into the game while doing PvP against P2W players. Do you still remember how tutorial used to be back in the time ? It was awesome for newcomers, DO removed it. When you play DO you think just like that, they remove good stuff and replace with shitty stuff, am i wrong ? Do you remember when even the log in page used to be awesome? Actual p-servers and clone staffs doesn't have enough ambition! They think "Oh my game have 50 players online so its all good". Little man, go beyond that, bring, thousands, alot of ppl, make a interesting tuto, a awesome ADS video and banner and leave it everywhere in the internet. ppl need to be surprised by a good game introduction which will soon make them addicted but DO never had it and nobody was ever ambitious enough to make it come true. Also, do not work alone, i know it's hard to find someone who you may trust, but you must find a solution and work as a team. As a movie teached me and i don't mean to offend anybody here xD... "Apes alone, weak. Apes together, strong!".

Thank you for the constructive feedback,

But I am a little confused on your first part because what you are describing is actually what i've done with space age:
it started as a 2009 classic dark orbit and then evolved gradually according to players needs with very little P2W. And it worked well in my opinion because it's still one of the most active servers out there. Reaching over 200 players online. I would have liked to push the game beyond 200 players but it is very difficult to find more dark orbit veterans. And my attempts to attract people that never played dark orbit were big failures.

I have tried advertising Space Age but without success, these type of game doesn't attract broad gamers: the style and gameplay is outdated. Only Dark Orbit veterans react to the ads.

I think WarUniverse game did some advertisement efforts to attract new players. But I doubt it was very efficient since the game is very similar to space age. Other p-servers with DO graphics can't advertise since they are illegal.

You are 100% right about advertising and making the game addictive while keeping it balanced without excessive P2W. Publishing games is all about marketing and using profits to reinvest in more marketing. But for it to work the game has to be a minimum attractive and enjoyable: the problem here is that for most 2022 players dark orbit (current or retro 2009-2012) is not attractive or fun.

What I want to figure out is if there is a way to make the game attractive and fun in 2022 to people that never played dark orbit.

Quote:

Originally Posted by gueuledange Thank you for the constructive feedback, But I am a little confused on your first part because what you are describing is actually what i've done with space age: it started as a 2009 classic dark orbit and then evolved gradually according to players needs with very little P2W. And it worked well in my opinion because it's still one of the most active servers out there. Reaching over 200 players online. I would have liked to push the game beyond 200 players but it is very difficult to find more dark orbit veterans. And my attempts to attract people that never played dark orbit were big failures. I have tried advertising Space Age but without success, these type of game doesn't attract broad gamers: the style and gameplay is outdated. Only Dark Orbit veterans react to the ads. I think WarUniverse game did some advertisement efforts to attract new players. But I doubt it was very efficient since the game is very similar to space age. Other p-servers with DO graphics can't advertise since they are illegal. You are 100% right about advertising and making the game addictive while keeping it balanced without excessive P2W. Publishing games is all about marketing and using profits to reinvest in more marketing. But for it to work the game has to be a minimum attractive and enjoyable: the problem here is that for most 2022 players dark orbit (current or retro 2009-2012) is not attractive or fun. What I want to figure out is if there is a way to make the game attractive and fun in 2022 to people that never played dark orbit.

This is 100% imo: i think the oldest HUD (2006-2009) is ugly, i haven't played space age since past year so i can't say about that game but, i think a good introduction is a good way to make people interested, for example:

Random day, i am X guy and i am navigating through the internet, i found a adversiment about Y game (Space Age for example), this game has a very beautiful banner, and a tutorial video which makes me really hyped ----(video construction example: first a small text introduction like "It is time", then some quick pvp scenes without names, changing screens real quick, then another text "To exterminate them", then another sort of screens but with group of players on PvE and following by ingame events, and then at the Banner with a quick text "SpaceAge MMORPG" with a constructive background)----. The login page sounds modern but nothing exagerated, it seems interesting. I signed up and before i could choose a faction a small story about the game appeared in my screen "story-text". After i choose my faction, i have spawned into a special map with phoenix ship, and next to me, there were 3 other ships, one named BigBoy (full flax), another named Vengeance (4 flax 4 iris) and another named Goliath (8 iris), there was a gate in the top middle of the map but i had to complete some steps like killing a streuner before i could jump (THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE THE ORIGINAL TUTO FROM DO... which teaches you the game mechanics). I can't wait to get stronger and see what adventures are waiting for me.

As i said at the beggining, imo the oldest hud is ugly, and the newest is kinda exagerated and have too many useless features. The best HUD came in 2010, and the best updates aswell. It wasn't exaterated modern which could make you lag and it wasn't like minecraft graphics which makes you bored.

You're right about being illegal to advertise games with similar graphics to DO, atm i can't think about a solution :/

The best tip i can give to you is to look for "Nova Raider" on youtube, it was a popular game similar to DO in the past, if you consider to mix them, it will help you to make a unique game, this is another way of reaching ur goal. By the way, the most awesome thing in this game imo, is that each ship has it's own attribute, so you would never use only one or two ships, but all of them for different purposes :)

For example, there is one ship which is extremally tanky, but doesn't do much damage, there is a ship which is weak but does a very huge damage, there is a ship which is weak but does a decent damage and it is able to use more techniques than others, there another ship which has a descent HP but not much damage and it has a very huge cargo bay, and another which is tanky and does a descent damage.

Another awesome feature from this game is that you can drop your own base anywhere in the galaxy and it would generate ingam-coin for you in exchange of a specific resource which is not hard to get. You are able to upgrade it's HP, SHD, DMG and attack rate, besides of it's own cargo bay and ingame-coin generate rate. This mini-base was passive, it would only attack the ones who attack it first.

Another awesome feature is that your clan have its own clan-MAP, which you're able to place your base, to grown more safely, in that map you're also able to place clan-bases to generate coin for the members and towers which attacks invaders.

Well, I think it's time to move to Star Atlas slowly (when it'll be out).

Quote:

Originally Posted by dasti555 Well, I think it's time to move to Star Atlas slowly (when it'll be out).

so your plan to move away from cash grabbing dying game is to move over to cash grabbing game that doesnt actually have any gameplay ? that is legitimetly the most pepega thing i have heard on this forum...

a game that launches with nothing but marketplace is nothing more than cash grab

This game has many years on it's back. I'm pretty sure new devs will do changes to the game.

Main problem here is same as always. Or you bot, or you're nothing. And looks they never realize that. Their playerbase is constant. Doesn't go up. Just go down. And new users are old users with bought accounts.

Even if they added tons of things to help newbies, it's not enough. They will end up tired soon or later since there's 2 years difference (in botting terms) between 1 and level 24.

At least, they gave something to do to UFE users. Unstable modules are a thing now.

Since we were discussing modern alternatives to the DO concept I figured i should share this :