I was curious if the Chuhn event had lured in new players or inspired old players to return, or created any sort of uptick.

Nope.

In the last month, DAUs are down 1% to about 6400, and MAUs have dropped by 11% to about 15,000. So basically, the game is holding onto its core, and the rest are dropping like flies. Notice that this can't go on forever. Losing 10% a month would have us down to 10,000 players by mid-January, and at that point there'd probably be more core players than casuals.

This also tells us that hardly anyone is joining the game fresh. It's going to have to be one hell of a revised tutorial, is all I'll say. Paired with a major blitz in advertising.

I'm not optimistic.

Whats worrying is it will make people think twice about buying GP. I know I for one will be starting to think solidly about whether I really want to spend money on a game that could be closed down in just a few months

The thing about doing this, is that it will accelerate the decline as Dan will see less and less money trickling in, so will likely shut up shop sooner

Yeah, I've had similar concerns. When I bought my Rifts, my thinking was that I'd get years of use out of them, and I was right.

But would I believe the same for a purchase now? Probably not.

C&C is appreciated. viewtopic.php?f=6&t=40829&p=425301#p425301

Dan would need to make one helluva adverting blitz if he wants to pull in a mass of players. Or... simply enter the smartphone market and MAKE THE GAME A FRIGGEN APP FOR CRYIN OUT LOUD!

I have to agree on this, even the suckiest of apps can easily pull in a couple of thousand players.

That would be pretty freakin' sweet. Not only would I love to see that as a player, the players Dan would bring in (and retain) would more than pay for any work that goes into it.

In the last month, some players will have gone back to school/college/uni etc. Don't read too much into usage statistics at this particular time of year.

I thought about that, but this slide of 10% loss has been pretty consistent for a while. School surely hasn't helped, but the decline doesn't seem worse than usual.

And I think the other posters are right - bottom-line, adding mobile would save the game. It's even well-suited to it and wouldn't need a drastic design overhaul. Of course, all the mindless clicking might not translate well into taps...

half my working hours are outside. So since most players are in North America I wonder if their will be any uptick in playing during the dead of winter - when I'm generally out of work sitting at home.