The first time you joined in how long and came to that conclusion?
I'm always around though, I am active almost daily, between Yankee Jack and myself we are always creeping around some where =D

So "Hers Johnny" , by your definition, when the server pop was 2 (including you), your solution the the perceived low player count issue was to leave? By your actions (leaving), you realize that you reduced the server pop by 50% ? Seems to me that you are part of the problem in this instance, lol! Play or don't play... but please don't bore us with your inane whining about nothing.

Your complaining about it does nothing to improve the situation is all, so it's just noise. The old "haves vs. have-nots" whining is another perfect example. Play, grind, & improve your situation if you don't like your position vs. the status of richer players... that's what they did, and by extension, what you have not been willing to do. And in case you hadn't noticed, every time the server has an impending map change, especially when compounded with a looming eco reset, the player base typically falls off sharply. The old "why grind now if I'm about to lose it all" thang... Watch the server pop jump after the switch, happens every time. And really dude, grow some thicker skin... just breaking your balls, lol. The 50% drop comment was my attempt at humor, the whining comment was not.

Its an unfortunate fact, but HL2DM is completely dead. I'm honestly surprised Valve still hasn't homicided the master server, or maybe all source games use some massive shared master server idk.

I think Jonny’s point isn’t a whinge, he’s saying the server might not survive if it doesn’t do something.

The good ol’ day’s of 15 players all fighting, arguing, saving and doing stuff are long gone. We might get moments during holidays when there’s a few on, but it’s not enough.

I’d suggest... more Easter egg hunts.

More things to do when there’s 3 players on and 2 are afk. A zombie invasion every 20 mins. More frequent supply box drops. Antlion attacks. All with bigger rewards. The economy is buggered already but all players like to earn easy cash, so just let them enjoy it. I know increased bot activity can cause crashes, but not if there’s only a couple of players on and if the server resets now and then, so what. More radically, how about a “Purge” every hour. All locks get temporarily unlocked for 2 minutes. So you can rush round and try to find and kill afk players?

My point is, the server should adapt to make playing interesting at low player levels. Then in time the basic appeal of the game, which is still as strong as it was 10 years ago, might kick back in and we’ll see the community come back.

Or… it does feel like the forum community is almost entirely gone and if no one really cares anymore I’ll just shut up.

Maybe if we had adapted 5 years ago we could have pulled it off, but tbh not many people are going to be interested in the large amount of dev work just for a server with 2-3 afk players online at any given time.

I can't quite remember when we went from 2 servers to 1 server (i lost all my shit because it was on the dead server and it was before the mysql-enabled plugin), but what would have been perfect would have been to find ways to expand. Maybe we were once popular enough to have connections with some of the Steam devs to have an influence to get more things fixed. Maybe we would have been able to get the mysql based plugin made earlier. Maybe we could have gotten access to a pre-release of orangebox to adapt the plugin ahead of time instead of losing 2/3 of the player base while the plugin got updated to be compatible.

But unfortunately all games die, and that's what has happened. It hurts to think back to how much fun I had with the DaneTrains™ and a server that was almost always jam-packed with 32 players with at least half being very active because that was a decade ago.

• Man... We all fucking grew up here. This isn't the only community I've ever been in for such a long time, but because of how I was a key part of this community for a stretch of that time, it's one of the most meaningful communities to me. I've watched several people literally grow up from being kids to being adults with adult lives. I can't believe I was only 12 or 13 years old. Like dude my forum account says it was created in September 2010, but I had an account earlier than that (there was a change in forumssso the actual date is no longer there). I might be getting fuzzy on some of the exact year's now as well.
  
  

I fucking hate that I'm old enough to wish I could go back to "the good old days".

Johnson’s post is why I’ve ceased mapping or support for cold ladders. I get a urge to do it sometimes but burn out fast because why bother.

“this is how the world ends, not with a bang but with a whimper”

When there’s no sign of the server owners for 6 months and Doggy’s last post was 3 months ago things are bad. When people like Cave and Rezoz, who’ve supported the server for years, are reading the last rights, it’s game over.

Reading the last few posts, I get it now. The problems a bit bigger than I thought. At some point, unexpectedly soon, looks like the server’s just going to disappear.

So, before it does, from me to you all:

1. This is and always will be the high point in global HL2 DM RP. Keep playing till they turn the lights out!

2. This stupid, frustrating, rage inducing, unjust and unfair at times glorious game – has been a huge distraction for a whole bunch of real world actual shit for a huge bunch of people. That’s not nothing.

…Now, time to stop dicking around in here, get proper jobs, meet people, fall in love, teach the best of what you have learned and go save the dam planet.

(NumbNuts)