Artifact. 8 online games that rapidly lost players

What are we talking about here?

Artifact is a virtual card game set in the Dota 2 universe created by Valve. The project was headed by the creator of Magic : The Gathering - Richard Garfield. Skirmishes between players (with different cards of course) take place on three boards, where only cards of the same colors and heroes can be played. Apart from that, the game is not very different from other productions available on the market - our goal is to weaken the opponent by destroying his towers and then attacking the so called Ancient. Most importantly, Artifact has been released in a buy-to-play model, and additional cards can only be purchased for real money; for example, through the Steam market.

What went wrong?

It may seem that Artifact's creators wanted to transfer the rules of the card games from the real world to virtual reality too precisely. The main reason why the players were not interested in the new game by Valve almost at all (though the first month was promising) was the business model mentioned just before. In the days where you can play multiple free-to-play card games, in which items are usually obtained by playing alone, releasing a paid production was quite a bold move. The whole thing could still defend itself if it was possible to "farm" ordinary card packages or the cards themselves, although the developers did not decide to do so. Eventually, it turned out that modern players were not ready for such a solution, although this was not the only problem of Artifact.

Even during closed beta-tests, it was pointed out that the developers practically did not listen to the players' comments at all and were reluctant to introduce changes in the card balance. There was also talk of a high entry threshold, which along with aggressive monetization simply deterred potential new users. Add to that the disappointment that Valve fans felt when they found out that the creators of Half-Life are working on another card game.

1. More about Artifact