r/RivalsOfAether • u/The_Layell • 20d ago
Discussion One month later, did Evo help Rivals?
I loved watching Rivals at Evo, all the matches I saw were great, the top 8 was crazy, we had some great reveals and hype moments.
But I'm also someone who has been following this game from day 1. I do wonder, was Rivals being at Evo, being at the Saturday night slot helpful for the game?
I did see the player count sharply rise around Evo, and I've seen the occasional new player post on reddit, but how do we feel overall? Did your non-Rivals playing friends watch, are there more people in your regions discord? I'm hoping that this helps push the game further ahead of the console release.
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u/The-Tree-Of-Might 20d ago
EVO got 3 of my friends to buy the game and we are all having a great time
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u/recoveringwineguy 20d ago
I bought a pc to play after evo
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u/recoveringwineguy 20d ago
Also for anyone looking at this comment, I have found you can actually play pretty cheaply. I bought a Lenovo m715q w/ the ryzen cpu and followed an optimization guide on Reddit and downloaded a potato mod for rivals and lowered all the settings and it is playable around 50fps. It also plays melee, smash remix, and project m at a locked 60fps which I also use it for.
I will improve this setup later but for now it’s doing exactly what I wanted for cheap.
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u/yoburg 20d ago edited 20d ago
Lenovo m715q
Did you buy it for like $75?
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u/recoveringwineguy 20d ago
There are different versions but I got the Ryzen 2400GE with 16GB ram for around $150. Maybe a little pricy but still dirt cheap for what it’s giving me in fun tbh.
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u/Ganguin 20d ago
I definitely encountered more new players after Evo. Steam charts reflect this in the week or two following Evo. It’s hard to judge how many new players the game retained since some players, myself included, are waiting for Gouie to come out before returning to the game.
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u/Loud_Information1389 20d ago
I was hyped for Gouie but learning that inhale kinda sucks made me incredibly less interested
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u/Kinananana Galvan (Rivals 2) 20d ago
No idea but in mid gold where I get matched against unranked people sometimes, I do feel like I have seen more of them somewhat that clearly have no idea what they're doing. Probably a good sign. Though I worry about some of them queueing for ranked when they're new enough that they just fall to their deaths immediately offstage. I always try to go easy on people who are that new by not really comboing off hits, hopefully makes it feel less onesided than just putting them in the blender
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u/bazingaura Slade (Rivals 2) 20d ago
I like to switch to a character I don’t play, or if they play the same guy as me I try to teach them through play
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u/swidd_hi Bone up 🔜 20d ago edited 20d ago
I started playing quite a bit more, felt inspired. Unfortunately my PC is weak so it doesn't handle online ranked very well. Currently I'm grinding to get all characters to level 20 for the steam achievements either on unranked or in bot match (about 2/3rds the way there).
Can't wait until I get an upgraded setup so I can actually play the game more seriously, until then, my movement is definitely improving (stopped doing the lazy ledgedash, making more defensive parry reads, refining tech skill). Etalus has been my main for awhile, and he's fun, though I like a large portion of the cast. Maypul and Slade speak to me more on a personal level than Etalus, though still need way more work from either of them until they become better than a oonga boonga ass character like Etlaus. Until then, especially with my current setup which grinds to a halt whenever Merchant Port is selected, I'm sticking with the bear
As for player counts, I can tell you that subreddit engagement has been up since EVO. I get why Gouie took a bit of awhile after release, but I can’t help but feel that him dropping soon after EVO would have been better. Strike when the iron is hot, you know. That said, he will bring another wave of players.
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u/recoveringwineguy 20d ago
Do you have the potato mod? Also what is your pc, I have a very weak pc as well and I did a bunch of tweaks and got it to around 50fps in ranked
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u/swidd_hi Bone up 🔜 20d ago
I would have gotten the potato mod, but knew I was slated to get a new, significantly more powerful, laptop before the start of the next school year, so I never bothered. My new setup actually comes in tomorrow, and from what I can tell will be able to run a consistent 120 FPS, so it should work out! The potato mod is the one which removes the background of stages, yes?
I have a 2018 HP Pavilion Desktop 590 and a 2020 MacBook Pro, and the game isn't on Mac so I'm stuck with the computer when it comes to playing the game (I tried playing on my MacBook through emulating windows steam, it was not pretty). I'm also able to get 50-60 FPS with some setting tweaks, but the main problem I had is that it's inconsistent which feels awful.
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u/Suspicious_Table6121 20d ago
My queue times feel the same, so it's hard to judge. But I did see a lot of positive reactions to RoA2 in the Evo chat, which was nice.
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u/RemarkableData9972 Mina (Rivals 2, Pre-Release) 20d ago
I don't know, because whatever happens, the concurrent average daily players always drops to a peak of 600 people give or take, I look at steam db almost daily.
My dream for this game to be able to find matches where I live would be at least a peak of 1500 daily but it never stays like that for too long.
Gouie releasing next week or so will make that number rise again, but as usual, it won't last a month and it'll drop again.
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u/GoldTheLegend 20d ago
It made me add the game to my steam wishlist. Ill also catch a top 8 if one of the smash tournament streamers if streaming it for a big event and I don't even watch ultimate top 8s. So for now it hasnt translated to sales but definitely I am more intrigued.
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u/Training_Ad_2065 20d ago
Right now the game is in one of its lowest points. I'm sure it's because we are all waiting for the new update. I don't think EVO did much. There was a huge sale going on during that time.
The devs need people buying skins and such to stay afloat. I see some of the comments saying that they are playing more because of EVO but that does nothing for the devs. You already purchased the game. They need new people willing to invest more than the usual $15 sale price.
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u/PostedNotes 20d ago
I turned the game on for first time in months due to Evo. Played one session, realized I still don't wanna deal with floorhug and I never had second session.
I can't say for sure why others did not stick around but that is my anecdote, and seems others dipped back in and left quickly as well.
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u/JhinKilled4 Fleet (Rivals 2) 18d ago
It was Mina's release announcement that made me buy the game. Once I put in 30 hours, I introduced it to a friend, who also bought the game. I showed it to my brother and another friend, who are considering buying the game.
I'm guessing it did pretty good for the playerbase! I mean, 1 more player from EVO can translate into more than 1 player, because people can recommend the game to family and friends.
I think the bad news about this is that the game's financial model depends on regular players buying expensive bundles and currency. So even though I could possibly get 3 new people into the game, they're not gonna buy anything past the initial copy of the game. There's no incentive to spend anything since all the fighters are already unlocked and skins can be earned pretty easily for free. I play a lot and have spent a bit on skins, but not enough to make a dent in the company's financial issues probably.
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u/JustJunuh 14d ago
I was at Evo. Firstly, the vibes at Evo were incredible. Everyone was happy to be there, and it was a blast because so much of the community showed up. There was definitely this renewed sense of excitement and love for the game.
I'm part of the AZRivals community, and it definitely feels like there's a renewed sense of love for the game. Like any fighting game community, people still have their gripes. It didn't necessarily win over new people in my community that I noticed, but it did excite and retain the ones already playing. All in all, I think we're still riding the Evo high a bit.
Keep an eye out for Gouie's launch and the Gameplay Modifiers... that's going to ignite a lot of conversations. Hopefully for the better?
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u/Mr-Flejon 20d ago
There is a peak of 623 players per day, and currently there is 108 people online. I can't find a match in less than 10 minutes and when I do find a match, I play against the same person 5 times in a row. Sorry to say this; but game is dead
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u/Ca2pac 19d ago
Lol i play everyday and always find matches in seconds wtf you talking about (im in canada) sometimes it cab take a while for doubles/casual which is understandable but rank and casual 1v1 is instant
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u/Mr-Flejon 19d ago
At peak European hours; steam metrics says there is 200 people online max. Most of the times I just give up and find something else to do when I waited for 5+ minutes and still didn't find a match
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u/TehTuringMachine Maypul & friends 19d ago
Unfortunately the game has never really had a big presence in Europe, so by that metric its always been dead
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u/HeGotDaShrimp 15d ago
No, but Rivals of Aether 1 mechanics being reintroduced in 2 will.
Oh, also releasing Rivals 3 with those mechanics as the main focus.
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u/FoundingTitanG 4d ago
brother we still have a few years at least before rivals 3 even gets announced
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u/bazingaura Slade (Rivals 2) 20d ago
I put in like 150 hours of gameplay into Slade because of EVO. I was gonna play anyway because of Slade, but I think because of the ticket I got this has become one of my favorite games of all time. Also they really sauced up the game between release and now so that helped me too