While things certainly have improved in Splinterlands mainly to make everything more sustainable, the big problem remains attracting new players. These are what I see key Questions in how to possibly solve this issue and pinpoints the issues that are still there...
Current Onboarding Numbers
With only 519 Spellbooks Purhased in the last 6 months, the inflow of new players has basically been non-existant for a long time now despite the 14309 Singnup. It's one of the things that the team is aware of and has tried to fix for a long time so they can get in a position to actually start to market the game more. However, the issues don't really seem to be fundamentally fixed just yet and I fear that an attempt at a marketing push will end up as a great deception and money thrown down the drain.
The Difference Between Talk & ActionsThe new player topic and having priority on that has been something that has been talked about for what feels like years now, yet nearly all actions continue to be toward making sure existing players continue to have ways to put more funds into the game. The things that have been done is hiring a marketing team (which still fully needs to prove itself) and get @davemccoy onto the team who at least is increasing the talk about new players by a lot. Generally, I'm still patiently waiting to see actually actions that might bring new players in while I see a lot of actions toward existing players and especially the whales.
Key Questions To Get New PlayersFor me, these are some of the key questions that need to be answered positively in order to actually get new players while right now at least from my point of view, they all are answered with a clear No...
1) Would You Start Playing Splinterlands if you had Zero investments right now ?Imagine where you were in a situation where you had zero investments in the game, would you in that situation leave it for what it is or start renting or investing in Cards and SPS to be able to play knowing it's quite a heavy investment even though the price of SPS is quite low.
For me, the answer is no as the 'Sunken Cost Fallacy' (even though I'm not in an overall loss since I started playing) would not be a factor. The main thing I would really miss (and miss out on) is actually blogging about the game. I don't believe that buying packs of the new set over time will be a profitable move given the price gap between old Wild and new modern cards. So just being a modern player makes no sense while the investment needed to actually be profitable in Wild/Survival is just too high. The one thing I would dare to buy would be SPS as I still see Splinterlands somewhat succeed and all mechanics in the game are designed in a way that value flows into SPS.
This first question mainly relates to the many players who left as they in theory should be the first one we see return in case there would be a new adoption wave. Right now, it's not looking like they are coming back yet.
2) Would Genuinely Recommend Splinterlands to Someone who asks you about it?Aside from the fact that I would like others to get in and help punp the prices, if someone would ask me if they should give Splinterlands a try right now I would in most cases give a clear negative answer. Only really in the case of someone who already is a Collectible Card Game player who sinks a lot of time and money into it daily, I would recommend giving it a try.
One of the key issues I have seen for a long time, in Splinterlands which nobody is really talking is the Crazy Time Requirement to be a player. Basically, you need to make Splinterlands your full time job in order to not miss out on most of the rewards needed to justify the investment. There is no real way to come in on a day or a moment when you feel like playing and do so while having the most fun experience.
Just today I played 30+ Survival Battles Manually while I should play quite some more to optimize my earnings while the actual fun I get out of the game fully comes from the 300+ SPS that I managed to earn and not so much from the actual game. The number of times when the battles are fun I can count on 1 hand as 10 battles I "surrendered" playing level 1 cards knowing I was likely going to lose against a player with better cards while I was up against lower-level players 15 times myelf.
3) Would Tell Friends about Splinterlands and try to get them in?
With the answer on the 2nd question as a No, I also would not spontaneously recommend Splinterlands to anyone even if it could potentially get me affiliate rewards. The reality is that if I would review Splinterlands as an actual game, I would only score it around a 6 with the potential to be a solid 8+. Unlike something like Balatro which I see as a real gameplay masterpiece and which I'm trying to get some friends into. Not only is that game 10x more fun, you can play it at any time of the day at the cost of only 10$ for a game that will last a lifetime.
What Is Needed For New Players To Come In ?
In the 2021 Adoption wave, everyone that came in had too much money in their hands because of the altseason bull market while it was fairly easy and straightforward to get in with 1 game format, no SPS staking requirement, high rewards and old card prices which were way higher compared to the new pack prices. Everything was booming including card prices which to this day I see as the main assets players want to see doing well. The time requirements also were a lot lower compared ti what they are niw
Right now, alts are still mostly wrecked, the entry level bar for Splinterlands has been raised a lot as you don't only need cards but also SPS while old cards indicate a sure loss on what you invest into new cards over time. New players also get a massive disadvantage over older players as there are many cards (including soulbound Reward and Gladius cards) they realistically can't really acquire. In modern which is the most realistic choice for now players, you also have to play manually which gives an obligated daily time investment. So I don't really see any selling point whatsoever for 99% of the potential new Playerbase for Splinterlands and I don't see how any new players aside from a couple who will actually come in. With many bag holders, it's also harder to push the prices up compared to SPS in the starting days which had almost no supply and lots of hype.
New Game Mode Needed !!!To me, it's clear that the only thing Splinterlands needs is a fun game mode where anyone can come in at any given point in time and spend some money to have the most fun gameplay experience without the need for any big investment aside from an entry fee while having the ability to earn some rewards based on their performance.
This should be easy to do with some kind of draft mode which only includes Max Level cards (which are provided by those owning them in return for part of the entry fees as passive returns). With an entry fee for a single round of somewhere between 2$ and 4$ which gives 30 Minutes to 2 Hours of gameplay based on the performance and rewards in the form of Packs (pack shards which can be turned into packs when having enough of them so players keep coming back), Soulbound Common Summoners that can play in Modern (to get new players started and give incentive to try modern), SPS delegations (so they get more incentives to play in modern and get familiar with SPS), ...
A matching system where you get matched against similar win-rate players along with everyone having similar level cards available should make it so that everyone gets a fair enjoyable challenge.If a Game mode like this was available where it was easy and cheap to come in giving the most fun and fair gameplay possible, I might be willing to recommend others to try it and to see if it's something for them.
ConclusionSplinterlands continues to have a big New Player Problem and I don't see how the upcoming marketing isn't going to end up in a massive deception as there it's anything about Splinterlands right now that is interesting for new players unless they want to make it their full-time job. If anything, Splinterlands just needs a game mode with a very low entry level, providing the maximum fun the game can be. I hope that I'm wrong on this and I guess time will tell...
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