Ok well I was honestly curious in the shift of the proportions of the community. Even before launch, I think as more information is released it's a good indication of what appeals to what community.

So I necro'd this thread http://www.gamesas.com/topic/1371410-who-here-is-an-mmo-virgin/, and the change has been pretty staggering.

When it was first necro'd the poll results were this:

62 Votes

Option 1: 16 votes

Option 2: 20 votes

Option 3: 12 votes

Option 4: 4 votes

Now, using subtraction the poll has pretty much done an entire 180.

Which begs the question...why did the non-MMO TES players lose interest? Or at least, why do you think so? I think it's pretty obvious that some feature that was announcing in particular probably made them think this game wasn't for them? In comparison, why do you think the MMO-playing crowd grew significantly?

I can't speak for others but personally, I lost interest since the confirmation of the subscription based model.

I play only for the subscription based model, though not because of regularity of content updates or whatever, for a much more selfish reason. I also love TES

I don't see the relation. Why must TES players not play MMOs as well?

The answer has multiple aspects.

1) This forum has had an ever declining population since the game was announced way back when.

2) Most of the people interested in the game and who really even knew about it were TES players to begin with.

3) Certain features have made certain people lose interest. Certain features also attracted a new crowd.

4) The game has had increased marketing for awhile now and that has led to more MMO players hearing about it and thus coming here.

5) There are quite a few people who like both TES and MMOs. Some of them have stuck around the longest. They are not rare here or even a small part of the population. Most posters here who have been here for any amount of time have played both TES and MMOs.

6) Certain people are satisfied with what they have seen and have decided to wait for the game to come out and avoid spoilers.

7) Other, I am sure I am missing a multitude of reasons for various people doing various things. People are unpredictable and the easy answer is usually not the right one.

I was hoping the game would be more of a sandbox where I could live a virtual life in Tamriel. I'm not interested in anymore themepark mmos. I've played almost every one of them on the market. That thread I made today about the game (which got deleted for obvious reasons) was my first real activity here in months. I only remembered this game when the beta came around last weekend.

Because of the poll questions included question which had definites like "I did not play MMOs" at all, and this option had a very significant portion of the percentage as compared to the current standing where it became the lowest-selected option. The proportion changed, very significantly. That always means a shift in audience.

1) That can't be right...over the 2 days the poll has been up, and the few days the poll was up when it was first put up, there has been a higher density of votes per time, and this is excluding whoever may have already voted as well.

2) Yeah...but this implies that the stream of purely TES players has ceased. What content scared them away (in your opinion) is my question.

3) Bingo, but what?

4) But surely this would attract TES players as well? Skyrim players especially, after marketing for console support.

5) Yeah, I know, but the proportions according to the difference from then and now is significant. Non-MMO players seemed to be a MUCH larger proportion of the population in the forum not long after it was first released.

6) Again, why is this seemingly only affecting TES players?

Basically I understand what angle you're presenting, but I find this change waaaaay too dramatic to just dismiss as the proverbial "ebb and flow" of a fan base. Non-MMO TES players specifically seem to have become less prominent, I'm wondering what change people think inspired this.

But you've played MMOs, you just admitted that. The question I'm presenting is:

Why did people who played TES and also never played an MMO go from being a healthy over a quarter of the initial fan base representation here on the forums, shrink to 1/7?

What about TES is not present in ESO that affected those people strongly enough to lose interest?

This forum is such a small sampling of the possible player base that I really don't think you can gain any statistically accurate information anyhow.

You are only getting a portion of the sampling that actively seek out and participate in forums, I don't think that really represents the possible player base as a whole.

TES in the traditional sense has been single-player. The player has the entire game world to personally explore and manipulate (within the scope of the game mechanics) however he or she wants. They cannot ruin anyone's gaming experience but their own through their actions, and if the screw something up, well, that's what saved games are for.

In an MMO world, at least in terms of what MMOs have become thanks to the narrow-mindedness of the industry and how it has perceived the fluke that is World of Warcraft's success, there is no personal experience. You play what the devs sell you and that is it. Nothing you do can really have an effect on the gameworld, because if it did, then a bunch of other people would have a tantrum and ride their self-entitlement wagon down the developers throats until they nerf the game.

Until the MMO development industry actually grows a pair of balls and actually decides to become innovative again, we won't see an MMO that offers the kind of freedom that the core series of Elder Scrolls games offers, and what the core TES fan longs for. It's not just the main quest or the profession guild quests that encourage a TES fan to spend THOUSANDS of hours playing in a single player environment. It's the ability to download and create mods that keep the gameplay experience changing. That level of modification will not be possible in TESO.

The faction thing, which does lend itself well to the PvP aspect, also serves as a straightjacket for those who are not interested in PvP. If I want to play a High Elf and explore Skyrim, then I must wait until I am level 50 to see what someone playing as a Nord can see at level 1. These sorts of invisible barriers to personal character development are off-putting to a lot of core-series TES fans who have not been so restricted in their choices of characters for FIVE successful TES games now.

These are the things that make me as a core-series TES fan a little disappointed in the direction they have indicated they are going with this game.

However, I am also an MMO player, so I can accept the decisions. But I am an MMO player who cut his MMO teeth on an MMO that has yet to have a true successor because the industry has shoved its collective nose so far up Blizzard's backside that they cannot see that what Blizzard managed to succeed at, everyone so far that has tried to duplicate it has fallen flat on their face.

And also, the core-series TES fan is not used to having to buy a TES game and then keep paying for it every month thereafter. They may buy DLC for it, but it is not mandatory to keep playing. So the payment model is off-putting. That's all I'm going to say about that...

Based on what has been revealed by ZOS at the conventions and such, TESO has a lot of things going for it that will make it feel like a TES experience. But for many core-series TES fans, I think that the gulf between it feeling like a TES experience and actually being a TES experience may just seem a bit too wide...

Time will tell.

For less F2P N00bs? Or to give yourself a reason to keep coming back to the game by investing in it? I like P2P for a bit of both, but it's not really why I play (or want to play) ESO. Half of it is probably because it's a familiar beautiful world I.E. lore, the other is because of what TES games generally bring that the MMO industry could use.

Doesn't matter, because both samples were from the forum.

It still shifted dramatically over time.

1) When did you put up the poll? In the midst of beta weekend? Most MMO players are on the internet all the time. That is the nature of the games they play. Most TES players are into single player games. Not well known for having really active forums. There is an inherent disparity between the two types of fanbases.

2) The initial curiosity simply wore off. Most TES players probably only know that they like single player games and don't care about MMOs. MMO actually has negative connotations in a lot of people's minds because of various idiotic media outlets and their publicity stunts. If this was any other MMO I would have left as well. I only stuck around because I really like the lore of this series. Considering how much of the lore community feels about the ESO lore, whether it is founded or unfounded, I am not surprised the population has fallen. Especially since I have seen many TES players downright hating the game from right out the gate. They simply never wanted a TES MMO. A bit childish and selfish but these are gamers we are talking about lol.

3) Hard to say, people are different. Maybe the subscription model. Maybe the faction locks. Maybe a variety of things.

4) How many of those Skyrim players like playing those kinds of games with their friends though? How many even heard the marketing? How many console gamers browse forums regularly? I sure as hell didn't until I started getting into PC gaming.

5) There was a HUGE influx of activity from beta testers. The vast majority of which were likely MMO players who know how to exploit beta invites like using multiple emails to maximize the chance of getting in.

6) Who knows? Are you even sure that statement is true? I am certainly not convinced of it from one poll. I have seen many lulls and surges on this forum. I have been here from the very start of this forum section, since announcement. A lot of the people have left and new ones have come.

The change that likely inspired this is that people realized it is an MMO. Despite it having a lot in common with the TES games, they likely cannot get over that stumbling block. I sure as hell would have if it was any other series. If there was a Dragon Age MMO, I wouldn't touch the damn thing.

Oh.. I know. I am and have been a devoted TES player and a member of the forums for years. This is just a new user I created a while back because we all need a shave and a haircut sometimes.

I play MMOs the same way I play singleplayer. Every character I come across is just another NPC to me. ESO plays no different. The same mindset will be shared with many others that will continue to heavily RP and may come across another player, hold dialog and join up to run a dungeon together. It's no different that having a follower in the regular TES series. Except you can actually talk to them and they have better AI.

... well most will have better AI.

If any "faithful" TES members are not around this forum much anymore, it's due to all of the things listed by A.D, and several other potentials like....

This forum has a bad reputation in the community as being littered with condescending jerks that have no reply but some smart ass comment to degrade and talk down to others. Hell, the moderators were constantly locking threads and passing out warnings like religious fliers.

Then you have the fact that info was rather stale and the shiny has worn off until release. So, others may have just gotten bored.

But I don't associate the seasoned members to abandon the forum due to favoring singleplayer over an MMO setting.

I don't think it's just the single-player factor. I think there are a lot of little things that have been stacking up that have put many (but not all, by any stretch of the imagination) core-series TES fans off this game.

It could also be that we are seeing the same kind of response that core-series fans have for even the core-series games. It's been announced. We've been shown a glimpse of what it will look like, Now we are just waiting for the game to come out, and just don't have much to say about it until it does. We have to remember that Bethesda Game Studios are just as tight-lipped when it comes to the core series TES games as Zenimax Online Studios has been about TESO. In fact, Zenimax Online has revealed more about TESO than BGS typically does prior to release. Maybe it's just a matter of community conditioning...

We'll see how it all plays out at launch...

I think the initial turn out of TES fans, no matter if they are into MMOs or not, will be staggering. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of TES players that have become long time friends through the forums over the years. ESO gives them the chance to RP the characters they have always played and actually play them together.

Unless they are in different factions...

It does matter, because you can't just 'apply subtraction' to informal surveys on an erratic sample size. Statistics and polling data don't work that way. You might as well have announced that you've applied blue to tuesdays for all the sense your comparison makes.

i would imagine that alot have entered beta, and even discussing the game at all could be breaking the NDA.

To be fair I answered option 4. In fact, several MMOs have stolen my life away. TES is my first love though, ever since Arena.

I'm sure they are in tune with that. they have been forming elaborate guilds for the past year.

Sorry, I don't think your theory holds up. The "I did not play MMOs at all" crowd even increased in absolute numbers from 16 to 23. It doesn't seem like people left. Instead, you have to keep in mind that the first results had a total TES-fan-bias. This is their forum. There are no MMO subforums and only a few multiplayer subforums here. This is an impressively skewed demographic.

No, I think a much more reasonable explanation is that since then, MMO players found their way here.

(Plus, some people might have tried an MMO in the meantime).

Completely unreasonable!

LoL or they dont care to vote like me

The first thing.
It may not be a whole lot of difference but I like not dealing with boatloads of children..I mean there'll still be some but significantly less