Unregistered Pop-Pop disconnects after 3 Minutes

I would like to make a point about the new version of pop-pop 1.0.2.

If you are an unregistered player, pop-pop will disconnect you from a game after 3 minutes of play. I guess that this is designed to persuade those unregistered players to register the game.

I (as quite a few people already know) have been playing pop-pop for quite some time now (unregistered), so in that respect, I should register the game, judging by the fact on how much fun I've had with it. However, the reason why I've been holding back on registering the game is due to the fact that I just cannot find enough players on the tracker. There have been many occasions where I have wanted to play an online game of pop-pop when there is nobody on the tracker. When I want a game of pop-pop, I should be able to play an online game, whenever I want to. I thought that this was one of the ideas of online play. I wanted to wait until the game got more popular, before I registered, so that I could ensure that I would have the maximum amount of fun with it.

Since Ambrosia has now started this 3 minute disconnect rule for unregistered players, this now means that even if I was a registered player, it would be EVEN HARDER to find someone to play against (unless I want to play at 3 am when most players in the States are playing I assume), because most of the players on the tracker are unregistered players.

My question: Why have Ambrosia done this? I know that they want to get more unregistered players to register the game, but don't they realise that people are not going to register, if they can't get an online game of pop-pop going?

-Cheers

3? It disconnects me after 12 or so. Usually I finish before then.

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It disconnects after 3 minutes....!!!

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Hrm. Sucks for you. Register.

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No. That's not the point I was making. It sucks for the registered users too!!

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Quote

Originally posted by Helix20:
**No. That's not the point I was making. It sucks for the registered users too!!
**

Well, I don't know when you've been playing, but it's been fine for me. Yes, I occasionally log on to find that there's noone there, but most of the time I can find a decent (registered) player of around my level. Besides, remember the iterated prisoner's dilemma:'I'm not going to do this because noone else does it'. If you start thinking like that, you'll never get a really active game.

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The unregistered time limit varies depending on difficulty level. Easy lets you play 15 or 20 minutes, and then it scales down to 3 minutes for expert. The time limits were intended for the initial release, but were forgotten in the rush to ship. Since that time, we've seen a good number of unregistered players who play frequently, so we've decided to implement this restriction as we had originally intended.

As for getting more players online, we are hoping to get pop-pop bundled on new Macs, just like we do with Deimos Rising and Snapz Pro X. We are also investigating whether to port it to certain other platforms.

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Matt Slot / Bitwise Operator / Ambrosia Software, Inc.

Quote

Originally posted by fprefect:
**The unregistered time limit varies depending on difficulty level. Easy lets you play 15 or 20 minutes, and then it scales down to 3 minutes for expert. The time limits were intended for the initial release, but were forgotten in the rush to ship. Since that time, we've seen a good number of unregistered players who play frequently, so we've decided to implement this restriction as we had originally intended.

As for getting more players online, we are hoping to get pop-pop bundled on new Macs, just like we do with Deimos Rising and Snapz Pro X. We are also investigating whether to port it to certain other platforms.

**

Certain other platforms....like BeOS? 😄 Haha, anyway that's good news, especially about bundling on new Macs. And the windows users...I suppose they can join in the fun if they really have to.

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I think that a port to Windows should be done...purely out of the fact that we really do need more players online...

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i thought this was a mac shareware company? i mean, what the hell. you guys say you in it JUST for the money, so why dont you quit messin around and just go windows only? i personally think you guys should give Linux a chance instead of supporting mircogay's OS...stupid..

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Quote

Originally posted by Zealous Cloud:
**i thought this was a mac shareware company? i mean, what the hell. you guys say you in it JUST for the money, so why dont you quit messin around and just go windows only? i personally think you guys should give Linux a chance instead of supporting mircogay's OS...stupid..

**

Zealous, please no flaming. I agree that Mac only would be great, but obviously that isn't the case. As for your opinion that Windows sucks, well in my humble opinion I totally agree with you. At the same time support the companies that are nice enough to release game for my Mac. And companies like Bungie no longer count. 🙂

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Well I just hope you register soon Helix -so I can kick your ass again! 🙂

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The Larch... The Larch...

The end result of the new changes is quite obvious. I haven't seen another player on the tracker day or night for 2 days. Whatever the reasons, whatever the justifications, the network scene is dying, and dying quickly. Something has to change or even the registered users will disappear. 2 weeks ago there were tournies, now its empty.

This toooown, is coming like a ghost town....

yeah...I am going to register the game when I next have the money - but I am very disappointed that the game isn't popular......

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It's 8:30 pm, and there are no registered users playing. THIS IS EXACTLY THE REASON WHY I HAVEN'T REGISTERED YET!!!!

I mean, come on guys!! If I can't get a game going at what I think is a prime-time slot for a game of pop-pop, then why should I register????

The only good thing about pop-pop is the online play (2 player mode on one machine doesn't work for me, because I am a lot better at this game than all of my mates)....

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I'm registering soon. Definitely by Christmas. I'll try and be on a bit more often, too.

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Quote

Originally posted by bigfatbass:
**The end result of the new changes is quite obvious. I haven't seen another player on the tracker day or night for 2 days. Whatever the reasons, whatever the justifications, the network scene is dying, and dying quickly. Something has to change or even the registered users will disappear. 2 weeks ago there were tournies, now its empty.

This toooown, is coming like a ghost town....**

Too True, There is almost nobody on. Where did all the registered players go that were on during the first month?

:frown:

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Think Different

I've done my best guys, I'd launched the pop Tourney which was restarted once (only) and even setting up a tourney webpage did not encourage anybody to take over new tournaments... so it's a bit disapointing indeed.
Helix I'm with you. I am less on the tracker lately but still checking once a day if I see anybody (new)... but that is not often the case, it's very quiet... come on!

And to those Windoze retractors, I disagree with you. Windows is good. But Windows is less good than MacOS... and for the sake of pop-pop it would be great to have it ported to Windoze...

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People need to just hang out on the tracker--have pop-pop on whenever they're online and potentially available to play. If you didn't want to play right then you could add something like 'away' or 'busy' to yr nick; but yr presence on the tracker would show people that you're around and that there do exist people who play the game. The problem is, people poke their heads in, see no one around, and leave: but what are the chances, with only about 30 regular players (is that about what it is?) that two'll happen in at the same time?

In short: people don't need to necessarily play more, just spend more time on the tracker. Then we'll see that there are really alot of people playing; and newbies will be able to see the potential of the online scene.

Maybe we can start a pop-pop contact list? So you could send someone an AIM/ICQ or whatever if you want to play a game. Having a web tracker, you can't tell if anyone is on or not. And if we got really good, we could have a program you could launch that would tell the server you are online, and would update a status icon on the web page. This would expire later.. but hmm..

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