Is Airport City Declining?

[Navigata07]

There was a time when the forum was buzzing with activity; often having close to 2000 new alerts and messages at any one time...especially during events. Nowadays, the activity level is hardly breaking 1000...even during events. Quite a stark decline, and a bit sad to see to be honest. Couple of questions to ponder:
1) Is Airport City itself the reason for the decline? Is it that the game just isn't as interesting in their latest developments compared to the days of old? The sophistication has certainly gone up, but is there something missing?
2) Are the other communications platforms (Discord, Facebook, etc.) finally having an effect on activity in this forum? Are those other platforms more active, or do they have a decline in activity as well? Maybe it's simply a smaller pool of active players more spread out among the various communication platforms.
3) Could it be that the information is so organized that there is no longer a reason to have discussions? The Wiki is a great effort that has come a very long way, and it's possible that all the things of chatter in the past is pretty much common knowledge for everyone now.

Curious if anyone else noticed the same trend and if they had their own theories as to what may have happened.

 

[Chloe11111]

1) Partly yes. There are certainly quality issues in the GAME. But I think there are also frustrations with cheaters and their inability to block them and to a lack of new things happening.
2) Discord isn't really busy. Very slow there with only a few active. I haven't even seen walter post there lately. Besides facebook - which tends to get about 100 unintelligent posts on every post they make, this is still the most active.
3) I hope so. But I suspect it is more the covid effect, post lockdowns maybe. We still see lots playing

 

[Husam]

According to what I see, the forum is increasing daily with the participation of new members and the number of views increases.
What matters is not the number of alerts you have or as you saw before, because it varies from one member to another. To evaluate the forum and the participation of members is not only in quantity, but other things must be taken into account, for example
There are members who prefer reading rather than posting.
Especially recently because they don't have questions like before and because they are very experienced in the game.
Changes in the countries of the world due to the Covid virus, now most of the members have returned to their normal lives and daily work, and their working hours have increased. These people follow the forum daily without logging in, but just guest.
As an administrator in the forum, I see what the average member of the forum does not see.
I cannot speak in details, but it is certain that I see an increase in the number of new members, the return of old members, a large number of posts daily.
There are many things that interest me to keep the forum working, but these criteria do not concern the ordinary member, but rather the owner of the forum. Here, I emphasize again that the forum is working well and better than before.
Now in response to the number of alerts that members see, it is not an evaluation of posts in all forum threads. There are private groups that have more daily chats than the general forum.
Other means of communication cannot be compared to the forum or may affect the forum. Rather, it is a quick way to talk that members use among themselves to communicate and it is not a substitute for the forum, there is a big difference between them.
The forum is the only site that has all the information of the airport city game, and every day there is an update of the data, and here lies the secret of it. It is a reference for everyone. The abundance of information in it about the game and the abundance of this information has led to most members prefer reading, and this is the key to the success of the forum.
This is my answer to your questions posed, and I leave room for the rest of the members to respond, and I apologize for the long post.
Thanks to @Dave and many thanks to wiki members and big thanks to all members in the forum and special thanks to those became VIP appreciated.

 

[Dave]

Looking at the statistics, I can see that the forum is still very much active, however as with most things, it does have the seasonal effect. It's that time of year where people start getting ready for Thanksgiving, Christmas etc.
However in the last 23 days, 752 active members, 146 new members, 160 threads created with 1919 new posts. I'm happy with that!

 

[Chloe11111]

Great point @Husam, it's true that there are quite a few private group chats. I certainly had one when we were still Xred alliance. And when we were preparing for the epic launch, we had a private chat for the organizers as well as for some of the big launches that ken kyu organized. Private groups are also keeping some stuff out of the main areas.

I expect we will see things uptick again when it's cold out in the northern hemisphere and the weather outside is less favorable

 

[ItsRalphy]

According to what I see, the forum is increasing daily with the participation of new members and the number of views increases.
What matters is not the number of alerts you have or as you saw before, because it varies from one member to another. To evaluate the forum and the participation of members is not only in quantity, but other things must be taken into account, for example
There are members who prefer reading rather than posting.
Especially recently because they don't have questions like before and because they are very experienced in the game.
Changes in the countries of the world due to the Covid virus, now most of the members have returned to their normal lives and daily work, and their working hours have increased. These people follow the forum daily without logging in, but just guest.
As an administrator in the forum, I see what the average member of the forum does not see.
I cannot speak in details, but it is certain that I see an increase in the number of new members, the return of old members, a large number of posts daily.
There are many things that interest me to keep the forum working, but these criteria do not concern the ordinary member, but rather the owner of the forum. Here, I emphasize again that the forum is working well and better than before.
Now in response to the number of alerts that members see, it is not an evaluation of posts in all forum threads. There are private groups that have more daily chats than the general forum.
Other means of communication cannot be compared to the forum or may affect the forum. Rather, it is a quick way to talk that members use among themselves to communicate and it is not a substitute for the forum, there is a big difference between them.
The forum is the only site that has all the information of the airport city game, and every day there is an update of the data, and here lies the secret of it. It is a reference for everyone. The abundance of information in it about the game and the abundance of this information has led to most members prefer reading, and this is the key to the success of the forum.
This is my answer to your questions posed, and I leave room for the rest of the members to respond, and I apologize for the long post.
Thanks to @Dave and many thanks to wiki members and big thanks to all members in the forum and special thanks to those became VIP appreciated.

Having been with the forum a long time. I agree with most of the points, but also feel it is a shame. When I first joined we didn't have alliances, and I blame them. All the chatter went n in the platform threads. Windows trading thread would hit pages and pages everynight, so much that we started a ne one every monday. Now we do it monthly, and to be honest it could be every 3 months as in a month it gets less than we got in a day. There are so many players who have all their chat in their alliance groups and private threads, and to be hnest I miss so many of those old names. I know they are active, but we are in far more silo's.

 

[simister77]

I want to thank all the long-term players for advice on Airport City. It has helped me immensely. I am one of those that read and post a response from time to time. But today I thought I should share my thanks to many great people on this forum.

FYI, most of my chatter is within an alliance. But the info other players post or ask questions, on this forum is not taken for granted.
Cheers

 

[Parker]

There was a time when the forum was buzzing with activity; often having close to 2000 new alerts and messages at any one time...especially during events. Nowadays, the activity level is hardly breaking 1000...even during events. Quite a stark decline, and a bit sad to see to be honest. Couple of questions to ponder:
1) Is Airport City itself the reason for the decline? Is it that the game just isn't as interesting in their latest developments compared to the days of old? The sophistication has certainly gone up, but is there something missing?
2) Are the other communications platforms (Discord, Facebook, etc.) finally having an effect on activity in this forum? Are those other platforms more active, or do they have a decline in activity as well? Maybe it's simply a smaller pool of active players more spread out among the various communication platforms.
3) Could it be that the information is so organized that there is no longer a reason to have discussions? The Wiki is a great effort that has come a very long way, and it's possible that all the things of chatter in the past is pretty much common knowledge for everyone now.

Curious if anyone else noticed the same trend and if they had their own theories as to what may have happened.

Well, as an old player, I simply lost interest in the game. I lock on a few times a day, but before it was quite interesting. Today, when you reach level 80, and no new levels for years, no new goals besideds stars, its all the same - same events, same all over. colors on planes - great news or ?. Destinations - well a few. If you look at other games they always develop things, set new goals and so on - GI still have bugs since I started 6 years ago - and no new levels and no goals. So I personaly think this is why less activity on this platform.
Reward for events are more or less buildings with coins/time - seldom a building with pax. No special buildings to have a goal to go on.
What do you think ??

 

[Madge59230]

Well, as an old player, I simply lost interest in the game. I lock on a few times a day, but before it was quite interesting. Today, when you reach level 80, and no new levels for years, no new goals besideds stars, its all the same - same events, same all over. colors on planes - great news or ?. Destinations - well a few. If you look at other games they always develop things, set new goals and so on - GI still have bugs since I started 6 years ago - and no new levels and no goals. So I personaly think this is why less activity on this platform.
Reward for events are more or less buildings with coins/time - seldom a building with pax. No special buildings to have a goal to go on.
What do you think ??

Quite agree. Events are very repetitious even in a new format. Collect hats… why…nothing to spend it on.. Boring boring. Thankfully I’ve still got flights to go but not for ever…. Then what…

 

[Pavolko_Gun]

1) Partly yes. There are certainly quality issues. But I think there are also frustrations with cheaters and their inability to block them and to a lack of new things happening.

This is a huge issue. A lot of active players got demotivated to play. You cannot compete in weekly ladder if just only 3 guys makes 22M PAXs without a sweat. We all know that to make 1M requires a lot of time and resources to do it "lege artis" and I believe 2M is possibe if you stretch yourself to the limits for some time. I have shown to GI how the cheating is done (the version used for a long time by mainly Russian alliances without them to be able to detect it - it counts to PAXs and to flights without losing any fuel, any item, etc. - there is no benefit as you will not save a single drop nor coins). You could bet what was GI reply and measures taken by them. I am seriously thinking what should be my next steps.

Important remark: I have never used this on my main game and I have stated that to GI that it is against my principles to do so. Only one of my support games has done it for 1 week to show, what you are able to do with even small game.

 

[LX Air - Teresa]

Private threads in this forum already existed when I joined it back in 2016… however, I’m convinced that the newer private groups feature is one of the reasons why the forum seems less active…
that, together with the discord channels - not the official one, but the ones managed by some alliances, and several dedicated FB groups.
I do my part on FB, advertising the wiki and the forum, and I like to think that perhaps some of the guests are here after clicking the links I often paste on FB comments…

 

[pete blake]

So often I've seen a perfectly reasonable question on the forum shut down, the enquirer told to get the answer from Wiki and made to look/feel like a fool. I for one am not surprised that people don't bother.
P

 

[LX Air - Teresa]

So often I've seen a perfectly reasonable question on the forum shut down, the enquirer told to get the answer from Wiki and made to look/feel like a fool. I for one am not surprised that people don't bother.
P

Well, if it’s there, what’s the point of writing all over again? Perhaps they didn’t know where to look… and a link to the wiki solves the issue

 

[Navigata07]

@Husam @Dave @Chloe11111 I just wanted to clear the air that this post was by no means an attack on this forum. Anyone who has kept tabs with me over the years knows that there is no better place for AC players to communicate than on this forum, and I want to thank all the admins who keep things running here. If anything, its my desire to see more public activity the motivation behind my post. However, I certainly see your points, and there is information that you all can see that us normal players can't. I'm glad to see that the forum is still very much active from your perspective.
I can see how the alliance and private groups have removed a lot of the public chatter, whether it is on this platform or elsewhere. I think @ItsRalphy may have been onto something with the silo effect. I would say a good suggestion would be for us to "reach out across the aisle" a bit more...maybe exiting our silos for some fresh air 😅
But I also see the frustrations with AC itself...all the things that need to be addressed as well as the lack of innovation. In all honesty, I think the lack of progress is the biggest culprit for the decline. To address @Parker 's point, he couldn't be more spot on. With no new developments and with the wikis capturing so much information already, there is no point for any additional discussion. It looks like the trend wont change much until GI addresses current issues and then become innovative. I'm usually not one to think that I can do things better than others, but the amount of ideas swirling in my head to evolve the game is massive, and I'm just one person. As I've often said, "just give me one day to call the shots at GI, and they wouldn't recognize the game when I'm done" 😁

 

[flyhores]

I only know that no matter how bad the game is, there will always be some people who are fanatical and will not give up until the last moment,
because every game can be said to represent a kind of religious belief, and believers will never give up their beliefs.
Of course, what I want to express is that this game is not as bad as imagined. Perhaps some people have diluted their original passion and dreams because of time.

 

[Navigata07]

I only know that no matter how bad the game is, there will always be some people who are fanatical and will not give up until the last moment,
because every game can be said to represent a kind of religious belief, and believers will never give up their beliefs.
Of course, what I want to express is that this game is not as bad as imagined. Perhaps some people have diluted their original passion and dreams because of time.

It's the potential that keeps many of us around. Let's be honest....we all love the game...maybe more than any of us thought we would. Even after so many shortcomings and uproars (especialy CBM, cheaters, and the 100 item limit), many of us have stuck through it all, and won't go anywhere until we fulfill our set goals and start to naturally lose interest. It's the concern of "fulfilling our goals with nothing else to do afterwards" that looms in the back of our minds.

It's also very sad that communication with the developers has been severed. I miss the days when Free2Play would post new events and developments, and we would all bicker and complain about the info, but turn around and ask him to not mind us and we appreciate him. Our voices were heard during those times, and we felt like we had somewhat of an influence in future developments. With no communication, the sources of innovation have waned: Developers arent speaking to us...leads to us getting frustrated....leads to us no longer motivated to throw out suggestions. The "Suggestions" section was my favorite part of the forum, as the creative juices really tend to flow from the thousands of players here. They promised more communication this year, yet there has been radio silence for months. It just greatly reduces morale and motivation on the creative front 😕

 

[ItsRalphy]

@Husam @Dave @Chloe11111 I just wanted to clear the air that this post was by no means an attack on this forum. Anyone who has kept tabs with me over the years knows that there is no better place for AC players to communicate than on this forum, and I want to thank all the admins who keep things running here. If anything, its my desire to see more public activity the motivation behind my post. However, I certainly see your points, and there is information that you all can see that us normal players can't. I'm glad to see that the forum is still very much active from your perspective.
I can see how the alliance and private groups have removed a lot of the public chatter, whether it is on this platform or elsewhere. I think @ItsRalphy may have been onto something with the silo effect. I would say a good suggestion would be for us to "reach out across the aisle" a bit more...maybe exiting our silos for some fresh air 😅
But I also see the frustrations with AC itself...all the things that need to be addressed as well as the lack of innovation. In all honesty, I think the lack of progress is the biggest culprit for the decline. To address @Parker 's point, he couldn't be more spot on. With no new developments and with the wikis capturing so much information already, there is no point for any additional discussion. It looks like the trend wont change much until GI addresses current issues and then become innovative. I'm usually not one to think that I can do things better than others, but the amount of ideas swirling in my head to evolve the game is massive, and I'm just one person. As I've often said, "just give me one day to call the shots at GI, and they wouldn't recognize the game when I'm done" 😁

Good points well made.

BY the way, I also remember when it was first proposed to merges the trading treads for the different platforms into one, and there was uproar as the windows players chattered too much!

 

[Chloe11111]

That's it! We need to dismantle the wiki to get the conversation going again!

 

[Madge59230]

That's it! We need to dismantle the wiki to get the conversation going again!

Allez….. go for it. Want me to start? ……

 

[Mirandair]

So often I've seen a perfectly reasonable question on the forum shut down, the enquirer told to get the answer from Wiki and made to look/feel like a fool. I for one am not surprised that people don't bother.
P

Honestly yes. I wasn't a newbie when I joined this forum, but I see this behavior a lot and feel bad for these kinds of posts from new players that get dismissed. I've posted totally reasonable/observant stuff as well that gets no replies. At all. Or it is dismissive. I am kinda surprised the forum isn't friendlier. Was hoping to make some new online pals! Instead I barely post because it is not very welcoming. But yes, just directing people to the wiki isn't very welcoming. I try my best to remember what it's like to be a newbie when I answer and help people out!

As for gameplay itself, yeah that seems to have declined a bit. Would be nice to have more destinations, levels, better events with new offerings etc. But that's not anything new ☺