The Downfall Of Online Catan

The downfall of the website Colonist.io, which is the main platform to play the online board game Settlers of Catan.
Let me know what you think of this video down below.
#colonist #settlersofcatan #catangameplay #boardgames #games #tabletop #tabletopgaming #competitive

[@__entiendo]

Colonist is also just so expensive. The fact that $9 a month only gets us the base is absolute robbery. I paid for a few months not too long ago but it just wasn't worth it, and now that my subscription is over I am reminded of how bad the ads are.

[@Tetus7]

Are you acquainted with uBlock Origin?

[@Alex-zc8nr]

Also, let’s just acknowledge here that they charge you $10 to simply change your username. Shows exactly who these people are. #boycottColonist

[@abhijeetsaraha9144]

Are you talking abour ranked? Cause I just double checked, and you can one time buy expansions for casual games, no need for subscription for those. And base game is still free.

[@AdamLis32]

@@Alex-zc8nr I can change my name for free. You do realize that like on playstation if you change your name more than a certain number of times, they also charge you $10. Notice the similarities. Just use colonist and play catan online or don't use colonist and don't play catan online. Stop complaining

[@gav7497]

Bro why are they charging more than streaming service rates for a fucking board game.

[@shadesonbroadway]

I ask the same thing :D

[@rilesw7576]

For 1 board game too! BoardGameArena charges $20/year for premium content with over 100 games. Plus only 1 player has to have it when playing with friends.

[@MACMAMI]

I'm still unsure what to think in the grand scheme of things as someone who only recently discovered Colonist admittedly, but I will say I found it peculiar that they give you all these coin purchase options on their shop.................yet they have little you can actually spend said coins on. Like what's the point in purchasing a 16,000-coin bundle.................if the total sum of every purchasable item in their store is only 2700? It just doesn't make a speck of sense. I also don't understand why they won't just provide you the option of purchasing other individual colors if you really wanted to but instead insist: "No no, you gotta make a recurring subscription in order to access them!"

[@shadesonbroadway]

Perhaps at some point additional items will be added later, but yeah. It needs a complete overhaul IMO.

[@MACMAMI]

@@shadesonbroadway Yeah. At the very least in the meantime they should allow you the option to purchase expansions individually as well as colors. It's rather strange to me, considering their exponential growth over these past several years, that they don't have a basic merchandise line in their store. I have to imagine from a strictly objective, business-oriented sense that rolling out a line of tees, hats, crop tops, thermoses, etc. would be a boon to their business operations.

[@spoookyspencer]

I agree, their store makes no sense to me and I just got into catan resently as well

[@kloklon]

it used to be like this before the subscription model. you could buy expansions and colors with the coins. old accounts could still do this, but new accounts are forced to use the subscription model instead. the predatory thing is still offering the coin bundles even though you cant spend the coins anymore. at the very least you should be able to spend them on a subscription.

[@Spazzfrom.1989]

and its only 3 colors too! 25 bucks for 3 colors! lol just play free

[@maff_]

Totally agree with the analysis. They’re not thinking long term and just trying to maximize short term revenue. With something like this it’s all about reach and player base; it’s cheaper to get 100k more players than it is to double your conversion rate of free -> paid. The community divorce is really odd too. Like what are they afraid of, inflation in the colonist coin economy? I don’t see the line of logic that leads to a bullet in their own feet

[@shadesonbroadway]

(Personally) I feel like it’s not about the coin inflation aspect, as it is no longer needing to support competition. Because the other communities host tournaments, it directly competes with colonists own ranked system. Removing the community support enforces less interest toward those servers and more into the site itself.

[@pdwu2b]

The base game plays fine on boardgamearena. Catanuniverse was excellent untill they changed server provider last year, apparantly their scripts were not so portable. But Catanuniverse is improving again, its playability is near where it used to be, I'm confident they'll get there.

[@lilyyoung1002]

Boardgamearens is great

[@HedaLexa]

Their moderation is also ... nonexistent, played multiple games with someone called (tw) Ad0lfH1tler and had people make death and r*pe threats to me and my little sister. The community is just all around disgusting and even after raising this issue (along with others) multiple times to the Devs they remain silent.

[@Funglutton]

I agree, one of the biggest issues they need to solve is the toxicity. They've made very modest steps towards this but it falls short of really addressing the problem.

[@hehexdhehexd]

$18 for online Catan yet World of Warcraft is like $12 lol

[@Funglutton]

Yeah the pricing is insane. I really doubt they're acquiring and retaining 1% of users at that price.

[@1223Marcel]

So I am new to colonist. I saw the game 1 month ago and love it. As soon as I started playing I wanted to use my whole gaming budget to buy all expansions and lose myself in the game. But when I saw it was a subscription base AND really expensive too, they lost $150 I was happy to spend on their product. But definitely not for sub base. That's robbery.

[@jmkhenka]

Catan is not a MMO like world of warcraft, where updates and additional content is released regulary. I was chocked to see there was a MONTHLY subscription just to remove ads, and twice that to own some expansions. this move will push people towards catans official game that has a single purchase for base game and expansions.. I like the web client more, it runs easier on laptops etc. The official client drains battery and is badly optimized.

[@RomaineChutckhan]

@@jmkhenka Does this open up the market to third party?

[@charonwave]

I agree, it's just bizarre that they removed the coins from community tournaments as it was an incentive to play, gets them more active players and in term more subscriptions so it doesn't make sense

[@skaylingop9673]

Hi @ShadesOnBroadway aka TheGiver, I really enjoyed your video and found the content engaging! I'm 9-months late, but I just wanted to point out a small discrepancy I noticed. For your reference, when discussing the monthly active players, you mentioned '700,000' in your verbal commentary. However, in the visual representation, it shows '7000K'. -- Just a heads up, '7000K' would actually represent a your intended number scaled by a magnitude of ten, or 7,000,000 players. I think you might have meant to display '700K' to accurately reflect the 700,000 figure you mentioned. Though it may not be worth the time/effort to change it now, I thought to mention this so it can be more aligned with your verbal explanation and if it wasn't just an editing error, but rather a fundamental error in understanding the concept, then you could correct the error mentally and use this information in the future. Keep up the great work with your videos! Best regards, Hi, @ShadesOnBroadway aka "TheGiver" I've been enjoying your video. I understand that this video is 9-months old, so it's likely not worth changing, but I noticed a small discrepancy and I wanted to share for future reference. In the video, while discussing monthly active players, you mention '700,000' verbally. However, the visual shows '7000K'. Just to clarify, '7000K' implies 7,000,000 players. I believe '700K' might be what you intended to align with your verbal explanation of 700,000 players. Understanding it might not be feasible to edit an older video, I thought this might be helpful for future content to avoid similar mix-ups. Your videos are informative and engaging, and I'm looking forward to more! Best regards,

[@adamstewart247]

Sounds like its turning into the "Myspace" of Catan. Everyone needs to just go back to Catan Universe.

[@JerryCricketGaming]

Just found your video! I just paid for Premium, but it does seem too expensive, so I might cancel next month because unless I can make a living playing catan (which I don't intend to), I don't seem to be able to justify the price when I can just pay once and get the actual seafarers or Cities & Knights physical board.

[@spoookyspencer]

the prices are outrageous as well.

[@shadesonbroadway]

Definitely.

[@Alex-zc8nr]

Let's not brush over the fact that they literally charge you $10 to simply change your username. That alone is enough of a reason to boycott this abominable company and service.

[@AdamLis32]

I can change my name for free. You do realize that like on playstation if you change your name more than a certain number of times, they also charge you $10. Notice the similarities. Just use colonist and play catan online or don't use colonist and don't play catan online. Stop complaining

[@aapjew18]

​@@AdamLis32The fact that playstation does this is also gross. There's competitors like catan universe, this is not the only way to play catan online. 'just don't play' is a poor response to a valid complaint. These people want to play, the company wants people to play, they just have an issue with their practices. So it's better for the players and the company if these complaints get stated.

[@donal4559]

I bought the Gold rush expansion and my friends can play without having the expansion. Maybe I misunderstood you but

[@darthskixx2263]

While discord communities are maybe not big compared to the rest of the players on Colonist, the assumption that the Colonist devs shouldn't care for them is so wrong. Because those players in the discord community are the strongest players - a "eSport" scene helps every game, also those players are super loyal and active and steadily encourage new players, and they are a target for earning money, I'm invested in Catan, and would invest money if they would doing their stuff better. (Idk I think they could improve their cosmetics and the other stuff is way too expensive) This is a dick-move from Colonist, and I think it's not even worth for themselves, idk how they profit out of that.

[@jordanpantaleo554]

My biggest complaint might be that reporting players seems to do nothing. I'd like to learn from Colonist how they handle when a player gets reported by their peers.

[@victormart]

Good elaborated video. Well deserved recognition. And I'm here recommending Colonist for a few friends that are getting into Catan 😂. Hit me up if you need anything. ~Mart

[@squeemac]

Ever since they revamped their ad presence (last 3 or so updates), this app loads like its 1990 on mobile.

[@griffindoran8264]

This definitely needed some attention. Thanks

[@amyjackson9284]

100% agree. I'm back to CU. Great video Shades.

[@tomvzar]

Hit the target audience with me, I’m about to run this up to the dev team. ❤

[@awe_re_ah7107]

I was getting into Catan around the time they offered founder packages. I'd like the ads to be removed after you see them once a day xD I really dislike seeing the ads everytime I click on a new tab or end a game.

[@Funglutton]

So you want to get a 60+ minute game experience for approximately $0.0001. Ads are an acceptable part of the value exchange and on Colonist they are not over the top.

[@AdamLis32]

So you want to watch KZbin with no ads for free. Thats not how things work. These companies need to make money or they will not be able to continue to operate

[@illustriouscacti]

I'm relatively new to Colonist and have some mixed feelings about their platform. Having a free option to easily play Catan, whether anonymous or through an account, is fantastic. The minimalist graphics for the board and pieces work really well and may be their biggest strength. The graphics for the scoring, however, are atrocious. Even when you're not using full screen mode, there's so much wasted space and the scoring, chat, and action log are crammed into tiny spaces while the blue water takes up all the space. Dumb. I wish they'd improve the trading menu to be more efficient. And of course, all the monetization is just gross. if a competitor came along and offered just a little bit more than Colonist it wouldn't take much for me to change platforms.

[@TP_Gillz]

its short term thinking. They want to maximize monetization now while the userbase is growing. Honestly, its a smart move. Because at somepoint, another platform will rise up and begin the process of taking users away.

[@jingyasun6292]

im a f2p on colonitst and let me tell you the LAG is INSANE. every time i try to use it it lags my entire computer. And my computer is a high end gaming laptop.

[@Funglutton]

It lags when laptops go into low power mode and there is I think a bug where it stays on. You can disable it via the Settings menu (Cog icon). Aside from that, it may be a browser issue/configuration. There are tutorials on how to resolve this.

[@maxianoacosta]

i just wanna play for free with real online people.. where can i go for that?

[@angelasenov6173]

I never played on Colonist but I urge people to Like this video so it could be shown to more people

[@shadesonbroadway]

Like and share would be appreciated. More unique comments on the video, the better the algorithm does. Thank you for your support.

[@rylandrc]

The network effect keeps them relevant and protects them from competitors.

[@smokey4435]

I dont pay anything and just use adblock

[@slimkim3046]

ur channel is underrated, wouldn't be surprised if it popped off soon

[@shadesonbroadway]

I’ll need to be more consistent with uploads first 😂 But thank you ❤️

[@abhijeetsaraha9144]

Arent the subscriptions only for ranked games? You can still do a one time purchase for casual games.

[@wattzongaming8138]

1 player needs a membership to use the expansions I believe

[@brycepowell6639]

I am so confused, when i go to the store i can still purchase individual maps and game modes lol? the subscription just seems like an alternative if you dont want to buy them individually.

[@theperserker]

Nice video. But why exactly does everyone hate Catan Universe? lol An Expansion costs 5€, seems fair to me

[@shadesonbroadway]

Their developers do not listen to their community, for starters. It’s much harder for any given device to connect to it, and colonist for its base game is free. Not including the large amount of issues they’ve had with their servers and bugs, plus all of the community (KZbinrs etc) jumping ship, that’s unfortunately the reason.

[@Funglutton]

@@shadesonbroadway that, and it looks like a 90s videogame.

[@BaneOfV]

Dang i really liked dylighted and colonist for a year now, this made me kind of dislike colonist a lot

[@lastyhopper2792]

Wdym, I just started playing this... oh no

[@shadesonbroadway]

If you’re just playing base it’s all good. It’s the subscription model that concerns me.

[@radkobachvaroff]

Two words, Richard Lewis

[@xfoolsgoldx]

Play on Board Game Arena.

[@hyde3176]

I play on Board Game Arena, I think its better than colonist

[@TASMAST3R]

Shades!

[@shadesonbroadway]

Yo wadup

[@mintedtaco]

@Shades On Broadway aren't you the shady guy who tried to PURCHASE a Discord tournament to profit from the community? The hypocrisy...

[@shadesonbroadway]

I also contributed toward a project called hexes.ai which intended to be a completely free online Catan platform. The original intent of the purchase wasn’t to profit by the way, that money was going to go to the current leaders. Thankfully it didn’t work out as I no longer play actively, but you don’t know the full story behind that ordeal.

[@brunobastos5533]

i like to play catan , this is the best online , but one thing i really hate is them stupid dice logic i add many games where low numbers rolled more than 8's and 6's and saw people with bad setups wining because of that

[@geran4473]

That's just low sample size. If you took the dice stats from all your games and added them together, you'd see a properly balanced normal curve.

[@shadesonbroadway]

I think the dice stats are fair. I’ve played over a thousand games (strictly online alone, countless more in person) and I’ve had variance of all kinds. I once played a game where 2 was rolled more than 7/6/8.

[@Funglutton]

Not to mention Colonist has a 'Fair Dice' option which distributes the results more tightly against the probabilities. So a 3 or 11 will definitely roll 11% of the match.

[@BlueSheep777]

@@Funglutton i hate that option. In real life there is no balanced mode

[@windums560]

0:28 I wasn't excepting Turkish name here. You failed in your pronunciation

[@windums560]

It's understandable though. It should've written like Göktuğ Yılmaz but English letters don't have it

[@danieljulia948]

But you can play for free! Just endure the ads. I play a lot of colonist recently and i havent pay a single peny

[@rustydawgt]

I think the pricing model is fair, assuming your estimate revenue I’d highly doubt they’re making a sizable profit with their costs and salaries. They’re innovating the game which is cool but it’s not going to be free if they’re trying hiring a team of full time developers to do it.

[@shadesonbroadway]

I understand the business side of it. At the same time, studios themselves have had every expansion purchasable for $5-10 as a one time payment. I’m just unsatisfied with how it is right now.

[@DrOmegaBattleSphere]

Shill. The website if covered in adverts which he didn't even factor in.

[@jacobshelton4507]

Promo'SM 😕

[@Frey123]

I would blame capitalism instead of this game studio. Subscriptions are a fact of life in the future. If it's not open source and creative commons from the beginning, just assume that it's going to be a subscription eventually.

[@SpencerTwiddy]

Huh? What are you on about?

[@SpencerTwiddy]

I haven’t heard anything about this drama before, so you can take what I’m about to say as being unbiased. Even though you tried to spin things as if you were right, I found myself siding with colonist and strongly disagreeing with you on almost every point you made.

[@SpencerTwiddy]

2:08 - did you even read this? If you did you wouldn’t have expected any other answer when you asked to transfer coins… he says here that giving coins as prizes for tournaments is not allowed anymore, so just transferring him a bunch of coins would have been useless

[@SpencerTwiddy]

Also, you came off as so passive aggressive in your dms, if you cooled your head you would see that who you were talking to was being reasonable and this whole thing is a nonissue

[@SpencerTwiddy]

It’s completely within their purview to no longer support coins and transfers

[@SpencerTwiddy]

You even untruthfully exaggerated the one statistic you had such a bad read on, saying it was “less than 1%” when the number he gave was 25%/20=1.25%

[@coopercordes9827]

Bro they employees and shit, you even said they’re trying to bring on more. Base game is still free (I would know, I play with my friends often). Do you want the business to die?