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> “Stupid claims,” is a little harsh.
I think claims about events that are not backed by any data are stupid. They’re useless, they’re misleading, they don’t get us closer to the truth. All the do is create mutual distrust. Anyone can just say whether fits their agenda, whether or not it has any basis in reality. I’m not a fan of that.
If you want to speculate, then clearly label it as speculation, and explain your reasoning for how you came to that speculation. Don’t just make claims because they fit your agenda.
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> I don’t know where you found your graph but different games have used different population counters. Halo 3’s was taken from an entire day, so (aside from H3’s population counter producing inflated numbers) it’s difficult to have taken those raw, aggregate numbers and compared them side by side against other games that had real-time (or near real-time) population statistics. I never said Halo 3 was unpopular, but I figured it was common knowledge that Halo 3 lost a significant chunk of its population in the months after launch. I found this post on Waypoint which was from the post-Reach era discussing, comparing, and contrasting Reach’s population versus H3’s population and discussing the population drop in H3.
I created the graph (and others), and the whole process is carefully documented, motivated, analyzed, and criticized in the thread found in my signature. When it comes to the data, first of all, the Halo 3 in-game population counter used to be real-time. It was only changed to 24h UU counts well after the release of Halo Reach. The counter was broken after an Xbox 360 dashboard update in 2009. However, that’s all irrelevant to the data we’re discussing, because it did not come from the in-game counter, but from the Bungie.net counter, which did not have the same reliability issues as the in-game counter.
However, the data in the graphs is indeed 24h UU counts. And you’re within reason to doubt it, because as we all well know, there weren’t any 24h UU counts for Halo 4. Waypoint only had a real-time counter, and the data you see for Halo 4 in that graph is based on that counter, (though gathered through the API to HaloCharts, where I sourced it from). However, if you assume that the (peak) 24h UU count is in a constant ratio to the peak real-time population, and that this ratio isn’t hugely different between games (as turns out to be the case for Halo 3 and Reach), then you can find that ratio and extrapolate the 24h UU counts from the peak population. Again, the reliability of this approach and the issues with it are discussed in the thread in my signature.
I don’t know if it’s common knowledge that Halo 3 had a significant drop in population in the months following launch. But obviously I should know that such a drop exists, because it’s right there in the graphs I made. However, what you did not account for is that this might be a completely natural phenomenon that happens to a certain class of games (namely, huge, highly marketed triple-A games), because when the game launches, a lot more people end up buying the game on the hype than would be genuinely interested in playing it in the long term. It’s there for Halo 3, but it’s also there for Halo Reach, and Halo 4. I’ve always been curious whether it might be there also for CoD, Battlefield, and all these other seasonal games that make headlines at regular intervals. The fact that there is a significant drop in population following launch doesn’t by itself tells us much, because there are a billion reasons why it could happen, not all of which are preventable. Now, if that drop becomes larger with each sequel, and your sales are not growing, then you might have cause to worry, because you can’t explain it away with people who would never have had huge interest (or lots of time to spend) in the type of game you’re making in the first place.
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> There have been equally as many “wild,” baseless claims made from anti-sprinters and you don’t step in and try to debunk those or call any of them stupid.
Because frankly, sometimes I just can’t be bothered right now. If you went and looked, you’d see that I have many times in the past criticized similar crazy claims from people who have completely opposite opinions to you. I especially used to do that in the more silent days of the forums when there was no time and effort to dedicate on more interesting things. Heck, part of the motivation for creating the population database was to debunk some of the ridiculous misconceptions some fans of Halo 3 had about the popularity of the game. I’ve spent much more time and effort combating those misconceptions than I have on discussing with you in this thread.
At the moment, I’m only focusing on you because you’re the biggest outlet of these wild claims in this particular thread at the moment. If you want me to focus on other people, then the best you can do is not to grab my attention. If you stop making these claims, eventually I will find enough energy to be frustrated with someone else.
) so I’m sorry if I’m falling short of your expecatations here. I’ve also offered more to the discussion then this one part of this one post.