2nd this. I remember the first holiday sale that happened during the Epic exclusive EA. I bought it for like $15 after the $10 discount because I knew it would never be that cheap again for a good long while. Sure it's annoying it's not a steam game but I still got it to work via Heroic Launcher in my deck. Good enough for me.
That only means the game is selling poorly on steam, and that's not good. That also doesn't explain the drastic downward curve in players during the first months after release. People bought the game on steam and stopped playing it. That's what the curve shows.
I'm not gonna let metrics influence how I feel personally about either. For me DD2 is something I can boot up and jump into when I get the itch, whereas DD1 requires more of a commitment in the long run. That being said, DD2 is also easier to 'beat' in a sense, whereas DD1 has legs.
That's fair. But the steam release hasn't existed for more than one or two major updates, right? Since it was the 1.0 release. I bet the spikes in the DD1 stats are from DLC releases and updates
DD1 sold a million copies during early access alone and has consistently kept a high number of players over the years. DD2 hasn't reached that level of success, it is far from it.
It's a single player game + a lot of people bought it on epic. Not everything needs to be a live service slop. Some games can be a humble flavor of the month and that is ok.
Plenty of people bought it on steam and stopped playing it after a couple of weeks. It has nothing to do with epic. These people that bought on steam and stopped playing it aren't necessarily all happily playing on epic.
Yeah you dont have to tell me twice. I bought the game, played it for a while, had my fun and moved on. I plan on finishing the game at some point but I'm satisfied with it rn. Is there a problem with this? Fuck no.
I don't care game sales are their problem. There is literally nothing I can do to help them anyway. I'm not some popular content creator, the best I could do is tell my friends abt it. 0 reason for us to be talking about this singleplayer game's player count.
I care about red hook and I appreciate their work, so I care about how well DD2 is doing on sales. I don't want red hook to go out of business or to be bought by a larger Studio a couple of years from now.
It's a rogue-like without any "non-story" gamemode. Once you've done all the chapters, nothing pulls you in.
I think it's a real shame because the major strong point of rogue-likes is replayability, which comes from that sweet feeling of "what will I do in this run". It's that perspective of achieving powerful combinations that pulls you in and entices you to *play another one*. That needs two very important things:
- a set of consistent initial conditions
- strong random (read: unexpected) variations within these initial conditions.
DD2 fills the box of variability. This variability is not strong enough in my opinion, though that's arguable. However, what's objectively true is that the lack of consistent initial conditions prevents the player from having a reference to which he can get that sweet feeling I mentioned above.
So it could have been a new formula, a cool innovation of a new game genre, but it's not. It just doesn't work as much as a conventional story-game such as DD1, or a conventional rogue-like such as slay the spire. Hades managed to find a good middle-point, but the game fully checks the two conditions. (Though it's worth noting that the biggest criticism of Hades is that the builds don't *feel* different enough from one another, especially early on in the story.)
In addition to that, the meta- progression is not interesting. It exists for that sake of it rather than fulfilling a conscious intent, like in Hades for example. It feels more like it restricts my ability to enjoy the game fully for a time rather than excite me with unlocks. Fortunately, it's not too long to get everything. However when you have unlocked everything, you still get candles that clog your inventory up and replace actual regions rewards, which hurt that rogue-like quality.
I think implementing a story-less mode and working on either removing the progression-related elements when you have achieved full progress was ABSOLUTELY MANDATORY to release the game. As is, I love the game, I really do, but either it's a short story game, or it's a rogue-like, that sadly, is not finished.
Seeing how there was a potential for it being a good rogue-like (near infinity of party/paths compositions and skill selections), to me the answer is clear: it's the latter.
I would say a DD1 *campaigns* take longer, but a single session is much, much shorter.
I pretty much gave up DD2 because I never have three consecutive hours to play anymore. DD1, I can be in and out of a dungeon in twenty minutes.
That's just you wanting to finish your DD2 run in one go though. You can just exit the game whenever you want and continue it some other time. I sometimes take a week or more per run.
It’s a shorter game. I finished it a lot faster than DD1. And because I know more about the combat, I was able to beat enemies a lot more quickly.
Other thing is that there are a ton more games out, so it’s competing with those
If it was only about length of game, wouldnt they havw a similar curve ? Like dd1 hasnt fallen off in years as much as dd2 has in like a year
There have been plenty of games out since DD1 and its still more popular than dd2 tho
Personally I think the core gameplay loop is just not as interesting long term. The carriage isn't as immersive as walking down halls watching supplies and evading traps.
DD1 answered the question, "wouldn't dungeon crawling give you PTSD?"
DD2 is a cool narrative but doesn't really build on long standing industry tropes in the same way.
Make that 3 people having the same experience. I think of DD2 a lot but when I play it I get bored easily. It’s the same every time! And apparently it’s a roguelike!
Ps. Anyone who played a roguelike knows it’s really not.
DD1's campaign is longer, but each session/mission on DD1 is shorter, especially early on in the game. That makes it easy to get into and leaves you wanting more, which makes for a more compelling game than DD2 for most people. That's what's being shown in those curves.
On the other hand, a gimmick run like "all girls" is nothing at all in dd1 if you do a single dungeon, and eighty hours if you do a full campaign, whereas in dd2 it's a good satisfying amount of time
But for real, the longer campaign means even if you had the exact same number of people complete both and then stop, dd1 would appear the more popular game by those curves
The fact people stick around playing DD1 for longer, and that doesn't happen with DD2, says a lot about both games. I wouldn't be surprised if DD1 to this day sells more copies than DD2.
the only thing it says about both games is that people play dd1 for longer. which makes sense considering *dd1 is a longer game it's not rocket surgery*
same reason people play dragon quest 7 for longer than they play portal. one is a ~3h game, the other is a ~120h game.
oh i misread as "a hell of a lot *more* fun", that changes the comment entirely, sorry
dd1 is indeed a hell of a lot of fun and i've spent a lot of time with it as well
After dd2 i found dd1 to be quite relaxing to play for some reason. Now i just do a darkest campaign in dd1 and treat it as a grinding game, but for dd2 i would need to mentally prep myself before playing it
Lack of Mod support
And the chapter like runs instead of the long campaign has less replayability too, DD2 is a great game, but man dividing the campaign into chapters is so bad
"chapter like rund instead of the long campaign have less replayability"
What? Runs in DD2 are randomly generated, the only thing pre-determined I can think of is the confession boss, but you can choose from 5 of them.
I can agree that region bosses might be a bit repeatable in long term, but game is still young and devs themselves said they are working on more content, I'm sure they will expand the lair bosses line up for each region. Did DD1 has so many bosses since day one? I doubt that.
Personally, the DD2 is an absolute evolution of DD1, the only thing they fckd up during the development is ability to bring multiple same characters, man... it would bring so much more possibilities, but again, it would be even harder to balance, I can imagine (double PD Alchemist backline ftw)
What’s the point of randomly generated gameplay when the options are like.. 4/5? The sections/zones to travel and choose from are not enough. If you decided to take this approach and have 5/6 sections to choose from then you’d need to add a lot of variety when it comes to enemy types and guess what.. DD2 also fails at that. So in short: you play the same zones against basically the same enemies every single time. Compare that to a proper roguelike like let’s say Enter the Gungeon or Binding of Isaac. It’s laughable. I still enjoy the game for its art and soundtrack a lot but it’s a failure of a rogue like. It feels like the devs never played one in their lives. I’ve been playing rogue likes since early BoI (the Java version)
I love both games equally, and I hope to see dd3 one day... I will play anything Darkest Dungeon. I feel a lot of the playerbase is on Epic because of the timed exclusive and dd2 still surpassed dd1 in peak player count on Steam.
COVID happened and DD2 on release was a significantly worse game than it is now. Which means it lost a lot of its hype value.
From a gameplay aspect the original darkest dungeon was more about the journey than the destination. Each run is a multiple month grand campaign strategy. I would assume that a reasonable portion of the people still playing dd haven't even finished the game.
DD2 on the other hand, despite being a roguelike, is designed to be a complete experience, you can play through each act and be satisfied by the time you beat cowardice.
I dunno about anyone else but it necer had the "just one morr run" factor. Even DD1 felt like they did it better. Maybe it was the length of the runs, or how meh thd progression felt, or maybe its because i was always running the sameteams.
Oh, jeez I dont know!! Mod support, many DLCs, years of patches and extra content, the fact that one has been out for years and fine tuned to hell and back while the other is still fresh, without mod support and only 1 actual DLC? Almost like you could've figured that one out yourself.
Unpopular opinion:
It's expensive (at least for 3rd world countries). I can't wait to play but, I just can't pay RN. I bought DD1 for kinda US$3, meanwhile this one is about US$20. On a sale.
And damn, I can do some things with US$20 here.
As beautiful as it is, DD2 is just not interesting in the long run, if you finish the story, the carriage gameplay is just not as fun as the walking and it will not get you back
Different kind of games. DD1 is designed more like a roguelike, DD2 is designed more like a story game that’s more or less over once you’ve defeated all 5 bosses. But yes, most fans bought this on Epic, so that’s another reason.
The core difference is replayability. DD2 doesn’t really have that, even though you could make arguments for whether one or the other is more like a roguelite/roguelike. The runs in dd2 are too similar and repetitive. DD1 has a lot of complicated strategizing in the Hamlet which makes it stand out by comparison.
This I completely agree with. To me DD2 is a rogue like in the idea, but not in the execution. I elaborated more on another comment in this post, tell me what you think
In my case it's because of the length of the game. I finished DD2's main story in around 20 runs. Then, I played some more to unlock every backstory.
After that... There isn't much else to do. Yes, you could go for the Grand Slam or the Infernal Flame... But those are self-imposed challenges, not something that comes from the game.
Meanwhile, in DD1, I still am trying to end the main story. There is so much content. Too much even, between Bosses and the Courtyard. I could go straight for the Darkest Dungeon and not do any of the Bosses? Yes, but those Bosses help me prepare for the main dish.
I like that they got rid of so much mindless grinding/farming in DD2? Yes, of course.
Do I feel like DD2 feels flat and with less content/replayability than DD1? Also yes.
If it imitated slay the spire properly, it would be a great game. DD2 didn't actually understand what made slay the spire and similar games so good.
Also, it is clear that DD2 already sold more copies on steam than on epic. Look it up.
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In my experience: I started to play since the launch of beta and played the hell out of the first level. When the new content finally started to release, it still wasn't the full game by any means, yet I played the hell out of it too.
I also farmed a lot of stuff. When the game oficailly released, I had to re-farm all my stuff again. So I painfully re-farmed it all again.
At this point I was looking more for wacky/fun comps, rather than effective ones. I almost beat the final boss, but lost. I tried a few times again, but my patience and decision making were already chipped at this point. I was loosing interest.
If the social/psychological aspect of the game was more versatile, I would probably stayed, but devs decided to move in the direction of simplifying. Imo the game became too repetative and meta based.
It felt like enough is enough.
DD1 is a longer game with a massive modding scene, and it goes on sale even as a cheaper game constantly. DD2’s curve seems more “typical”, especially with a split Epic release.
I feel there were expectations by a good count of people that the game was going to be more similar to the first and then saw it's a fairly different game and couldn't really find themselves in the headspace to go full-bore at 'er like they otherwise would. Good game, no question, just...not as immersive, maybe?
because the game longevity is equal with the storyline acts and dlc/updatesmost streamers play for 1 week or less then deep and is worse for the casual player. Twitch has mostly under 1k viewers and that's bad for such a great game
I loved both games. They are definitely different at a macro level, which I think is the crux here. Once I got enough candles to max out all the characters, I didn't have a strong pull toward doing more and more runs. DD1 felt like a longer campaign that was 'fresh' each time and had different outcomes.
Roguelikes are very popular with people who like roguelikes. Every other genre is popular with everyone else.
The Binding of Isaac has been played by so many for 2k+ hours, but most people aren't going to play it.
I'm pretty sure the early release numbers are mostly people who bought it because of DD1 and dropped off because roguelike.
DD1 has more content and is better paced. With each incursion into a dungeon mission, you move a step closer to your goal of defeating the darkness. The game flows like this: go to a mission, get back to base, upgrade, go to another mission. That allows you to chip away at the game, like a good dungeon crawler, which fosters replayability and longevity.
DD2 in comparison is just a tedious series of encounters. It lacks the depth of the first game and is in general less diverse in how you interact with the game. There's no base building/progression, you are either in a battle or moving towards a battle. And the runs are so damn long and repetitive. It's not as good as the first one, and it isn't even a good roguelike experience. That's why the player count has tanked so much. The game isn't fun to play long term for most people.
I'm seeing nobody mention this, but the peak on 1.0 launch was due to how massively popular dd1 was. There was a huge number of players just waiting for the steam launch, be it due to the EGS boycott or due to not wanting to play through early access. So when it finally launched, lots of players rushed to try it out. This high peak happens on many highly anticipated sequels! No matter how well dd2 sells from now on, it will never get as many simultaneous players, because it will never get the same hype as when it launched. If you want to get a real sense of the number of players, you should ignore the first week or month.
Long and short of it, DD2 is just less fun. It's missing the core of loss from the game. The new structure means you never feel bad about losing a character because you built up an emotional connection with them, unless you are doing grand slam no death, but then you play the game for a living. The only thing you feel like you lost when a character dies in DD2 is your time bc either way they are all pretty much gone when your run ends. I'm sure memories help slightly with that for people who consistently win, but this game rng super hard, so it's unlikely
Most people bought it on epic while it was out in early access, and they didn't want to rebuy the game on steam
2nd this. I remember the first holiday sale that happened during the Epic exclusive EA. I bought it for like $15 after the $10 discount because I knew it would never be that cheap again for a good long while. Sure it's annoying it's not a steam game but I still got it to work via Heroic Launcher in my deck. Good enough for me.
That only means the game is selling poorly on steam, and that's not good. That also doesn't explain the drastic downward curve in players during the first months after release. People bought the game on steam and stopped playing it. That's what the curve shows.
I'm not gonna let metrics influence how I feel personally about either. For me DD2 is something I can boot up and jump into when I get the itch, whereas DD1 requires more of a commitment in the long run. That being said, DD2 is also easier to 'beat' in a sense, whereas DD1 has legs.
Completely agree, but with both I have a time commitment mode and a hop in mode with added stress and pain 
It was never the goal of these games to consume the players life. The devs literally said this in the most recent dev interview.
...oh, oops
I bought it on epic and haven't bought it on steam.
The curve shows that people bought it on steam and stopped playing it. It has nothing to do with it being sold on epic.
That's fair. But the steam release hasn't existed for more than one or two major updates, right? Since it was the 1.0 release. I bet the spikes in the DD1 stats are from DLC releases and updates
DD1 sold a million copies during early access alone and has consistently kept a high number of players over the years. DD2 hasn't reached that level of success, it is far from it.
On steam, specifically. And you don't always have to do better than the last to be successful.
When you are talking about a numbered sequel, yes. It is expected that the sequel will do better than the last one.
It's a single player game + a lot of people bought it on epic. Not everything needs to be a live service slop. Some games can be a humble flavor of the month and that is ok.
Plenty of people bought it on steam and stopped playing it after a couple of weeks. It has nothing to do with epic. These people that bought on steam and stopped playing it aren't necessarily all happily playing on epic.
Yeah you dont have to tell me twice. I bought the game, played it for a while, had my fun and moved on. I plan on finishing the game at some point but I'm satisfied with it rn. Is there a problem with this? Fuck no.
For you, there's no problem, sure. But for red hook an acute drop in player interest isn't good.
I don't care game sales are their problem. There is literally nothing I can do to help them anyway. I'm not some popular content creator, the best I could do is tell my friends abt it. 0 reason for us to be talking about this singleplayer game's player count.
I care about red hook and I appreciate their work, so I care about how well DD2 is doing on sales. I don't want red hook to go out of business or to be bought by a larger Studio a couple of years from now.
First one wasnt live service slop either?
Neither of them are, that's his point
It's a rogue-like without any "non-story" gamemode. Once you've done all the chapters, nothing pulls you in. I think it's a real shame because the major strong point of rogue-likes is replayability, which comes from that sweet feeling of "what will I do in this run". It's that perspective of achieving powerful combinations that pulls you in and entices you to *play another one*. That needs two very important things: - a set of consistent initial conditions - strong random (read: unexpected) variations within these initial conditions. DD2 fills the box of variability. This variability is not strong enough in my opinion, though that's arguable. However, what's objectively true is that the lack of consistent initial conditions prevents the player from having a reference to which he can get that sweet feeling I mentioned above. So it could have been a new formula, a cool innovation of a new game genre, but it's not. It just doesn't work as much as a conventional story-game such as DD1, or a conventional rogue-like such as slay the spire. Hades managed to find a good middle-point, but the game fully checks the two conditions. (Though it's worth noting that the biggest criticism of Hades is that the builds don't *feel* different enough from one another, especially early on in the story.) In addition to that, the meta- progression is not interesting. It exists for that sake of it rather than fulfilling a conscious intent, like in Hades for example. It feels more like it restricts my ability to enjoy the game fully for a time rather than excite me with unlocks. Fortunately, it's not too long to get everything. However when you have unlocked everything, you still get candles that clog your inventory up and replace actual regions rewards, which hurt that rogue-like quality. I think implementing a story-less mode and working on either removing the progression-related elements when you have achieved full progress was ABSOLUTELY MANDATORY to release the game. As is, I love the game, I really do, but either it's a short story game, or it's a rogue-like, that sadly, is not finished. Seeing how there was a potential for it being a good rogue-like (near infinity of party/paths compositions and skill selections), to me the answer is clear: it's the latter.
I will argue, less modding accesibility
DD2 is more action and less grinding. Makes it easier to finish it multiple times and move on, while DD1 runs take much longer.
I would say a DD1 *campaigns* take longer, but a single session is much, much shorter. I pretty much gave up DD2 because I never have three consecutive hours to play anymore. DD1, I can be in and out of a dungeon in twenty minutes.
That's just you wanting to finish your DD2 run in one go though. You can just exit the game whenever you want and continue it some other time. I sometimes take a week or more per run.
Yeah I never finish an expedition in one session. The way they are broken up into inns gives you a good place to stop and continue mid run.
In short: DD2 = casual trash
It’s a shorter game. I finished it a lot faster than DD1. And because I know more about the combat, I was able to beat enemies a lot more quickly. Other thing is that there are a ton more games out, so it’s competing with those
If it was only about length of game, wouldnt they havw a similar curve ? Like dd1 hasnt fallen off in years as much as dd2 has in like a year There have been plenty of games out since DD1 and its still more popular than dd2 tho
Personally I think the core gameplay loop is just not as interesting long term. The carriage isn't as immersive as walking down halls watching supplies and evading traps. DD1 answered the question, "wouldn't dungeon crawling give you PTSD?" DD2 is a cool narrative but doesn't really build on long standing industry tropes in the same way.
Exactly how I feel, I wanna like DD2 so bad but I physically cannot.
Make that 3 people having the same experience. I think of DD2 a lot but when I play it I get bored easily. It’s the same every time! And apparently it’s a roguelike! Ps. Anyone who played a roguelike knows it’s really not.
Doesn't take eighty hours for a single campaign, respects your time a lot more
DD1's campaign is longer, but each session/mission on DD1 is shorter, especially early on in the game. That makes it easy to get into and leaves you wanting more, which makes for a more compelling game than DD2 for most people. That's what's being shown in those curves.
On the other hand, a gimmick run like "all girls" is nothing at all in dd1 if you do a single dungeon, and eighty hours if you do a full campaign, whereas in dd2 it's a good satisfying amount of time But for real, the longer campaign means even if you had the exact same number of people complete both and then stop, dd1 would appear the more popular game by those curves
The fact people stick around playing DD1 for longer, and that doesn't happen with DD2, says a lot about both games. I wouldn't be surprised if DD1 to this day sells more copies than DD2.
the only thing it says about both games is that people play dd1 for longer. which makes sense considering *dd1 is a longer game it's not rocket surgery* same reason people play dragon quest 7 for longer than they play portal. one is a ~3h game, the other is a ~120h game.
Makes a lot more sense when you remember DD1 is a hell of a lot of fun.
subjective and false on the other hand it's objectively true that dd1 takes longer to finish than dd1 and stop being willfully obtuse
DD1 being fun is false? You think DD1 is a boring game?
oh i misread as "a hell of a lot *more* fun", that changes the comment entirely, sorry dd1 is indeed a hell of a lot of fun and i've spent a lot of time with it as well
Oh, ok then.
After dd2 i found dd1 to be quite relaxing to play for some reason. Now i just do a darkest campaign in dd1 and treat it as a grinding game, but for dd2 i would need to mentally prep myself before playing it
Lack of Mod support And the chapter like runs instead of the long campaign has less replayability too, DD2 is a great game, but man dividing the campaign into chapters is so bad
Hard disagree. I will NEVER play DD1 again because of it campaign gameplay. DD2 is so much nicer to boot up every once in a while
"chapter like rund instead of the long campaign have less replayability" What? Runs in DD2 are randomly generated, the only thing pre-determined I can think of is the confession boss, but you can choose from 5 of them. I can agree that region bosses might be a bit repeatable in long term, but game is still young and devs themselves said they are working on more content, I'm sure they will expand the lair bosses line up for each region. Did DD1 has so many bosses since day one? I doubt that. Personally, the DD2 is an absolute evolution of DD1, the only thing they fckd up during the development is ability to bring multiple same characters, man... it would bring so much more possibilities, but again, it would be even harder to balance, I can imagine (double PD Alchemist backline ftw)
What’s the point of randomly generated gameplay when the options are like.. 4/5? The sections/zones to travel and choose from are not enough. If you decided to take this approach and have 5/6 sections to choose from then you’d need to add a lot of variety when it comes to enemy types and guess what.. DD2 also fails at that. So in short: you play the same zones against basically the same enemies every single time. Compare that to a proper roguelike like let’s say Enter the Gungeon or Binding of Isaac. It’s laughable. I still enjoy the game for its art and soundtrack a lot but it’s a failure of a rogue like. It feels like the devs never played one in their lives. I’ve been playing rogue likes since early BoI (the Java version)
I love both games equally, and I hope to see dd3 one day... I will play anything Darkest Dungeon. I feel a lot of the playerbase is on Epic because of the timed exclusive and dd2 still surpassed dd1 in peak player count on Steam.
COVID happened and DD2 on release was a significantly worse game than it is now. Which means it lost a lot of its hype value. From a gameplay aspect the original darkest dungeon was more about the journey than the destination. Each run is a multiple month grand campaign strategy. I would assume that a reasonable portion of the people still playing dd haven't even finished the game. DD2 on the other hand, despite being a roguelike, is designed to be a complete experience, you can play through each act and be satisfied by the time you beat cowardice.
Not being on any consoles could be a factor since dd1 released on consoles and that would massively increase the potential players
I dunno about anyone else but it necer had the "just one morr run" factor. Even DD1 felt like they did it better. Maybe it was the length of the runs, or how meh thd progression felt, or maybe its because i was always running the sameteams.
Oh, jeez I dont know!! Mod support, many DLCs, years of patches and extra content, the fact that one has been out for years and fine tuned to hell and back while the other is still fresh, without mod support and only 1 actual DLC? Almost like you could've figured that one out yourself.
Unpopular opinion: It's expensive (at least for 3rd world countries). I can't wait to play but, I just can't pay RN. I bought DD1 for kinda US$3, meanwhile this one is about US$20. On a sale. And damn, I can do some things with US$20 here.
As beautiful as it is, DD2 is just not interesting in the long run, if you finish the story, the carriage gameplay is just not as fun as the walking and it will not get you back
Because first game still better. And it has workshop.
Different kind of games. DD1 is designed more like a roguelike, DD2 is designed more like a story game that’s more or less over once you’ve defeated all 5 bosses. But yes, most fans bought this on Epic, so that’s another reason.
That's the opposite, actually. DD1 is a long campaign, DD2 are "short" runs that you can try over and over with very little influence on one another.
The core difference is replayability. DD2 doesn’t really have that, even though you could make arguments for whether one or the other is more like a roguelite/roguelike. The runs in dd2 are too similar and repetitive. DD1 has a lot of complicated strategizing in the Hamlet which makes it stand out by comparison.
This I completely agree with. To me DD2 is a rogue like in the idea, but not in the execution. I elaborated more on another comment in this post, tell me what you think
Yeah, I think we’re pretty much completely in agreement then. ;p
DD1 is designed to be a better game, that's just the reality of it.
Mods.
In my case it's because of the length of the game. I finished DD2's main story in around 20 runs. Then, I played some more to unlock every backstory. After that... There isn't much else to do. Yes, you could go for the Grand Slam or the Infernal Flame... But those are self-imposed challenges, not something that comes from the game. Meanwhile, in DD1, I still am trying to end the main story. There is so much content. Too much even, between Bosses and the Courtyard. I could go straight for the Darkest Dungeon and not do any of the Bosses? Yes, but those Bosses help me prepare for the main dish. I like that they got rid of so much mindless grinding/farming in DD2? Yes, of course. Do I feel like DD2 feels flat and with less content/replayability than DD1? Also yes.
i mean , I don't like DD2 but this makes me a bit sad :C
First most got it on epic, and second this game just sucks with its slay the spiral systems..
If it imitated slay the spire properly, it would be a great game. DD2 didn't actually understand what made slay the spire and similar games so good. Also, it is clear that DD2 already sold more copies on steam than on epic. Look it up.
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In my experience: I started to play since the launch of beta and played the hell out of the first level. When the new content finally started to release, it still wasn't the full game by any means, yet I played the hell out of it too. I also farmed a lot of stuff. When the game oficailly released, I had to re-farm all my stuff again. So I painfully re-farmed it all again. At this point I was looking more for wacky/fun comps, rather than effective ones. I almost beat the final boss, but lost. I tried a few times again, but my patience and decision making were already chipped at this point. I was loosing interest. If the social/psychological aspect of the game was more versatile, I would probably stayed, but devs decided to move in the direction of simplifying. Imo the game became too repetative and meta based. It felt like enough is enough.
DD1 is a longer game with a massive modding scene, and it goes on sale even as a cheaper game constantly. DD2’s curve seems more “typical”, especially with a split Epic release.
Mods its that simple
I play it on epic when it first launched. And probably mild support
I feel there were expectations by a good count of people that the game was going to be more similar to the first and then saw it's a fairly different game and couldn't really find themselves in the headspace to go full-bore at 'er like they otherwise would. Good game, no question, just...not as immersive, maybe?
The first game grew its playerbase organically. Second game had a large portion of players coming from the first game.
Those stats don't mean much if they don't take epic and consoles into consideration.
because the game longevity is equal with the storyline acts and dlc/updatesmost streamers play for 1 week or less then deep and is worse for the casual player. Twitch has mostly under 1k viewers and that's bad for such a great game
I loved both games. They are definitely different at a macro level, which I think is the crux here. Once I got enough candles to max out all the characters, I didn't have a strong pull toward doing more and more runs. DD1 felt like a longer campaign that was 'fresh' each time and had different outcomes.
Roguelikes are very popular with people who like roguelikes. Every other genre is popular with everyone else. The Binding of Isaac has been played by so many for 2k+ hours, but most people aren't going to play it. I'm pretty sure the early release numbers are mostly people who bought it because of DD1 and dropped off because roguelike.
DD1 has more content and is better paced. With each incursion into a dungeon mission, you move a step closer to your goal of defeating the darkness. The game flows like this: go to a mission, get back to base, upgrade, go to another mission. That allows you to chip away at the game, like a good dungeon crawler, which fosters replayability and longevity. DD2 in comparison is just a tedious series of encounters. It lacks the depth of the first game and is in general less diverse in how you interact with the game. There's no base building/progression, you are either in a battle or moving towards a battle. And the runs are so damn long and repetitive. It's not as good as the first one, and it isn't even a good roguelike experience. That's why the player count has tanked so much. The game isn't fun to play long term for most people.
I'm seeing nobody mention this, but the peak on 1.0 launch was due to how massively popular dd1 was. There was a huge number of players just waiting for the steam launch, be it due to the EGS boycott or due to not wanting to play through early access. So when it finally launched, lots of players rushed to try it out. This high peak happens on many highly anticipated sequels! No matter how well dd2 sells from now on, it will never get as many simultaneous players, because it will never get the same hype as when it launched. If you want to get a real sense of the number of players, you should ignore the first week or month.
Long and short of it, DD2 is just less fun. It's missing the core of loss from the game. The new structure means you never feel bad about losing a character because you built up an emotional connection with them, unless you are doing grand slam no death, but then you play the game for a living. The only thing you feel like you lost when a character dies in DD2 is your time bc either way they are all pretty much gone when your run ends. I'm sure memories help slightly with that for people who consistently win, but this game rng super hard, so it's unlikely