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The Elder Scrolls Online - 2024 a bad sign of things to come?
I want to preface this with a few things. First, ESO exists outside of steam and on consoles. So the population counts are nearly impossible to know 100%. Second, I'm not saying the game is dead and abandon ship.
With that out of the way, steamcharts is an interesting metric to look at is it offers, in a way, the closest thing we have to an unbiased representation of populations. Now not the full population, but its the only metric available to the public if the game exists on steam. ESO in particular is interesting because its been on steam for a little over 10 years now. So we have a good amount of information to draw from.
Typically for me, games that have existed on steam for awhile and are multi platform/launcher; steam is a generalized indicator for overall health of the game. I find if a trend exists on a steam, a similar trend will exist on other platforms in my experience. So if there's a downward trend on steam, it often feels like there is a downward trend overall. It may not be by the same percents nor with the same numbers, but its a downward trend none the less.
Now 2024 is a big year for ESO. It is its 10 year anniversary. So there was a big year long celebration of some free DLC give always. Along with a new DLC release that introduced the typical new content, but its major thing was spell crafting and styles. However, in the second half of 2024 we're seeing numbers in average and peak player counts that have not been this low since 2018.
This is a bit surprising and troubling. The main DLC was released on June 3rd on PC. And there was not much of a population jump. It also fell almost immediately the following month more than it gained. There was a big PvP update in September that saw very little impact, which probably doesn't bode well for future PvP support in the game. This was also combined with the release of 2 new companions.
As we move into the Holiday and Christmas season, we're going to start seeing discounts that typically come out around this time jump up populations. ESO right now i think is 75% off, so that's why already in the "last 30 days" we're seeing a jump. And we will probably see this increase continue. But the year to year trends of ESO have been going downward since it peaked in 2020.
This is a common trend I find in the industry. During the COVID lock downs, people had more spare time and were inside more. So it seemed like mmorpgs everywhere saw a population jump. And we're now experiencing the downward slide of that peak. The big question is if this will stop and where for these various mmorpgs.
So with ESO it becomes a question if things will plateau out soon, or will this continue. If you hang around the various feedback forums for ESO this year; you saw quite a bit of feedback. Any of these could lend itself.
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Formula Fatigue - Content updates/DLC releases aren't introducing enough things that feel "truly new". They feel too much like the same content, but with a new coat of paint. And mini games like the antiquity system or the card game didn't interest people much. The solo/duo infinite archive (similar to torghast in wow) didn't seem to have a huge impact overall too.
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Spell Crafting and Spell Styles were a let down. Again they didn't feel unique, didn't introduce enough interesting mechanics. A lot of the new abilities felt underwhelming and were just a mix and match of already exisiting things in the game. It allowed some builds to have access to some buffs/debuffs that it didn't before. But it didn't introduce really a "new way" to play the game from a feeling perspective. Or in the case of spell styles, didn't really change much (many of them have been recolors which has led to people feeling apathetic about them).
3. No interest in PvP content
4. The combat design complaints are coming to a head
5. Game releases in general feel too "safe"
6. Monetization
7. WoW has seen significant success with the war within/classic and is draining players from all the other mmorpgs
Whatever the reasons may be, the trend is certainly troubling and I'm sure is stirring discussions over at ZoS. If the trends we've seen since 2020 continue, then by the end of 2025 ESO on steam will be at population levels it saw in 2017. In 2026, population levels it saw in 2016.
What will be especially interesting is that was we move into the late 2020s, we will see an uptick in marketing around TES 6. Which will probably lead to more interest in ESO. The big questions will be what kind of impact will it be and when TES 6 does release, what will it do to ESO's population going forward?
As long as combat looks and feels like this, they won‘t attract any new players…
I only played ESO because I liked Skyrim and elders scrolls lore a lot. I could play like 5 months max and then quit for a year, haven't played it since 2023 Summer. For me the combat is turn off , I like action combat like in New World but in ESO it feels bad. Everything in overland is so easy and you don't feel progression at all. If it were not based on elders scroll lore I would have never touched it.
For me the combat isn't even that bad, it's the character progression that's almost completely lacking. I've never delved too deep into the game, maybe 5 hours every couple of years, so maybe it gets better at some point. I just felt that I could put one point into a skill, never upgrade my gear, and I could still cakewalk my way through every overworld encounter.
I like MMO's because you have a character that you invest in. In ESO I could start a new character every month and they'd feel the same.
I adore eso and have been playing on and off since closed beta but the game is really suffering from playing too safe with new content to the point jt became formulaic and repetitive while at the same time ignoring years long issues that needed fixing and/or rebalancing asap.
They are adding zones that while beautiful feel very repetitive and soulless, like you have zero reasons to visit any city or village in them after the 1 to 3 quests there got completed, the questlines are also getting so repetitive, safe and predictive and they are presented like the devs are talking to a 5y old that they need to recap what that's all about every time you advance one step in the quest lol
The fact that the game also became braindead easy in all content except trials (that are exclusively group content) after the one Tamriel update started to bleed players out of boredom once the novelty of going anywhere with no dangerous/leveled mobs to trouble you wore off.
As someone who returned to the game after a years long break, this stood out immediately.
Seems like they’ve been re-skinning the same content since Greymoor.
This game is incredibly easy. There's no challenge.
Left for WoW this fall. I like ES, but MMO became too boring and even after I rolled for heavy attack build it lasted as long. Combat in ESO is a real mess. Also, for my surprise, I left cause I haven't felt my role in frankly RPG. Nowadays everyone wield a staff and have same 3-4 abilities. No rotational difference, no class uniqness. Nothing to chew my teeth on as I personally like. Left for WoW cause there I can clearly differ myself as DH from say warlock or DK or hunter. The feeling of different classes and a lot of new thing is great. Even greater is World Soul saga. Smth big on the horizon is in my case crucial for any MMO I play. I dig the lore, I enjoy factions. Everything has sense. In ESO these days everything is meaningless. Nothing to wait for and new - you know exactly that there will be faceless addon and xpac with 2-3 dungeons. They are good mayb, but they are pointless. Nothing changes, the world is stale and doesn't move anywhere. =( Even trading died eventually, as everyone with a glimpse of sense can have millions in their bank in no time.
TL:DR
- classes are the same
- combat is awful
- professions are useless
- the plot is no existent
- even money and trading are bland
Yeah this sorta underlines why I think ESO needs to lean more into the whole "appeal to the singleplayer TES games in a MMO format" and open world. It feels like any mmorpg that tries to compete by providing the typical endgame PvE/PvP formula (instanced PvE content in raids) is fighting an uphill battle. WoW and FF14 dominate that scene so much that it can be tough to really stand out from them. So many people I've met across multiple MMORPGs who are interested in the kind of endgame that WoW/FF14 covers, they always go back to those games for such experiences. Your combat needs to be super unique and engaging to bring in players. It feels like ESO did try this, but it just didn't have wide spread appeal.
Didn't they just announce recently that the game is a money printer?
I actually quit playing a few months before the most recent expansion. I fell in love with this game during covid and after awhile I lost interest, due to the following:
PvP - I am a huge PvP enjoyer in mmos, but it got to the point where all PvP matches were against the same players, with every season a new bug induced build would be the only build I’d be playing against. Not to mention the world PvP events were lag festivals where it was impossible to enjoy.
Overworld - everything in the overworld was so easy it made the questing feel incredibly dry and anticlimactic. Time to face this dlcs main boss? Oh no, the world is ending, I’ll just auto attack the boss while watching YouTube.
New areas and events - literally every single new event was just a reskin of a previous event already in the game.
Lack of class identity - regardless of class, the build variety was incredibly lacking given that you were forced to use the same skills as everyone else.
Ultimately, you play a game like elder scrolls for the exploration and the story driven quests. Now there were some pretty good stories within eso, but they were overshadowed by the lack of any type of challenge whatsoever.
Lastly, the game tried to replicate the magic of the previous elder scrolls installments, but something about it just doesn’t feel right. Stealing had no consequence and a lacking of variety of items you could actually steal. The dark brotherhood questline, amongst others, were locked behind grinds that took forever and lacked variety. The cash shop also was so incredibly predatory. If you wanted to roll a new character get ready for endless grinds and hundreds of hours to catch the character up or pay $100 to max everything out from your other characters.