So, for the past few months quite a lot of my friends have joined the game and quit the game.

I've tried to figure out why so many have quit despite largely enjoyin the game.

Reason for Quitting:

1. The Menu System is High Mountain to Climb

- old menu system good. it's visual.

- new menu system bad. what is it?

2. The Seasonal Experience is not an Introduction. 

- the seasonl experience does not introduce players to content that can be PLAYED

- the main quest line is an extreme turn off. players want to PLAY and EXPLORE. 

- the main quest line FORCES players AWAY from PLAY and EXPLORATION

- seaonal has no introduction to the menu system. I've mentioned this in other post extensively. Go find them.

- the introduction to NARU gear comes too late. by the time someone gets enough of it to PLAY and EXPLORE they have already become disgusted by being lead around against their will to the next thing and have quit the game.

3. Lack of Inventory Space 

- Girls are reticent to use something before they can understand how to use it

- This leads us to filling up our inventory with EVERYTHING you provide us, but using none of it for fear of doing something wrong

- You don't teach us what to do

- You don't provide us any clue how to do it (see my extensive explain of a video guide Tutorial NPC you should just permanently have in the game)
- If a friend isn't there to teach us each step we WILL quit usually.

The exceptions to this is when we've come to the game to get away from something already going on in our lives that's some complicated sorting out this stuff feels like a victory. In all other circumstances it is likely a process of defeat we don't wish to have. 

- As a friend said the other night, "It's such a fuss to do do anything." 

The lack of inventory space is a really large problem. I would suggest making Olvia or Velia have a completed inventory by default so new players can have somewhere to dump all of the inventory stuff you give them for later sorting. At the very least it would confront the basic issue that have ZERO inventory space means going out and PLAYING and EXPLORING is further prevented. 

4. We just want to play together.

No group content untl you have 256 + ap = no way to play together.

- this is not good.

- want to see a girl do something again and again? involve her and another person with that thing

- want to see a girl quit something or never start it to begin with? remove her and her ability to play together with at least one other person meaningful to her in some substantial way. 

I've said this for years, but you won't wrap your minds around it. Now that the game truly has no friend-to-friend grind content until your already in PEN Seasonal Gear and the only option to do ANYTHING to advance your seasonal character is the VERY SOLO main question... well... extremely extremely hard to find a reason for most girls to keep playing. Faith that there's something on the other side of getting over with seasonal seems to be the only staying factor. And if that fails? Goodbye.

So, you have a real problem retaining girls.

Where do you succeed?

1. Character models. They are the best in the industry.

2. Cosmetics. It would be fun to have a few more of these that are pretty and outside of holiday events, but on the whole cosmetics are a win.

3. Gyfin. I don't know anyone who doesn't love upper gyfin.

4. Elvia, Inner Castle Ruins. There's nothing to get trapped in (ground clutter), it's not exactly pretty, but it's atmospheric. We get frustrated easily. Keep pushing the "be frustrated button" and well... we're emotional creatures. Our brain is set up to hold emotions a little while like platforms to move about on. Giving us only the options "frustrated" or "ugly" doesn't do well. 

5. Exploration. We love this. I think if you'd make Seasonal be an Optional Lifeskill start you'd keep a lot more of us. Again... Archeology as a lifeskill would go over very well, too. Any kind of "Go and see it" reward is better than "go and kill the same thing endlessly.. alone.. in an ugly place. Don't do this. Fail. WE can choose if we want to go there, but if you force it? Nope. Also, extend the places available to go for herb grindind. Again and again I say this. You have the most beautiful game in the industry. Put the life skill stuff in beautiful places. It will be much desired. 

6. Boating. This is weirdly popular. Unfortunately, it was more popular when the boats actually worked. Remember when we could pull up AGAINST the dock instead of having a meter wide gap between the boat and the shore? That was nice. Why'd you remove it? Things like that turn people off.

- also, you never explain how to do anything with sailors. there's no indication at all anywhere i have ever encountered in the game that says "sailors can eat balenos meals". And so, the yellow bar for our horse stamina, I mean boat stamina (why do boats have stamina???), er ... sailor stamina.... anonymous yellow bar... runs out and we never figure out how to fill it again. "Broken content. Stupid game." That' what happens. 100% of the time in my experience. "Oh boating is cool! Wait. Why does my boat have a stamina bar? How do I fill it? This is stupid broken crap!" ...and she never plays the game gain. Repeat, repeat.

7. Diving. I can't emphasize this enough. I don't know any of us who aren't into swimming and underwater content. Just give us the tools PLEASE!

-  again, again, oysters were very looked for as a new life skill swimming and underwater content... and then you never did it. At least never made it profitable.

Why not let us have underwater breathing on some piece of equipment and some kind of wide area magic scan and collection tool? This way the frustrating motions of underwater swimming won't be an issue. We can just take the boat out to sea, swim down to the gathering area, scan, and start collecting. Infinite gameplay value with tons of money in cosmetics waiting for you here. Why don't you do it?

In summery,

A video Tutorial NPC or just a video tutorial tab from Fughar would be SUCH A MASSIVE IMPROVEMENT.

- just tell people how to get through the menus in a clear visual way

- make the npc something they can trust in and you'll retain a lot more people 

Make life skills an optional seasonal path to gear 

Make get people away from using main story line as an introduction to the game. Omg I cannot stress this enough. 
Give ALL Naru Equipment IMMEDIATELY. Don't screw around with this. We bought the game. We want to play it. Don't let us play the game we bought and we quit. That's just social contract 101. You messed with a lot of people already. Most quit.

Fix the beginner player inventory situation. There just isn't enough of it at your person (not really a problem since you can learn past this), but there is not enough of it at ANY storage to EVER get enough of it OUT of your inventory INTO story to get on with PLAYING THE GAME. So, either give Seasonal Characters infinite storage or figure out a way to let them offload their confusion and game-blocking 'rewards' to somewhere else than their person until they are ready to use it. 

Stop treating beautiful locations as things to be avoided for even life skillers. 

Stop treating life skill as a non-existent desire for players to enter into your game through. Help them branch out of it later. 

Thanks

So just becuase females can't manage inventory there should be a change, that is not a good reason to change. The system seems to work for others and if they are not willing to put the time into the game and actually find out how to play. (there are thousands of tutorials and guides on you-tube) they will most likely quit anyway. This game is highly grindy and has an immense depth of activities that can be done. All of it requires large amounts of time and those that do not want to spend the time to learn will quicky move on to other games. 

As a girl, I feel very ashamed for being a girl after reading this thread. You made it look like girls are stupid and need to hold someone's hand to get through the game. Yikes. 

I dunno how all of this is only "girls" problem. I'm not even gonna comment the stuff you mentioned, cuz you invalidated everything by saying it's a girls problem. As if boys can't have the same problems. Lmao. 

no1 will dm you and ask you out for a date OP.

Sorry, but OP has some very valid points imho, however I´d say they apply to newcomers of any gender. At least they apply to me. All my friends who I brought here stopped playing after season the latest. Some never even got there cause the game´s usability is one giant mess or they did want to play together with me, however you cannot play this game together early on.

They did not like about their new player experience:

- atrocoius menue overflow system from hell - Like really, just when looking at the screen there are like 50 clickable icons or texts!

- inventory clutter - As bad or worse as any trashy mobile ripoff game. You can make money in other way but the amount of duplicate items is absolutely confusing.

- no questing with your friends - I HATE THIS, MY FRIENDS QUIT FOR THE SAME REASON :(

- no early group PVE grind, everyone for themselves - as above

- boring linear questline that takes no real advantage of the world, i. e. no nice sidemissions - Well, this game had it forever and i guess it won´t change. Still not a selling point. Getting voiceovers for every quest will not change this issue, merely sugar-coat it!

- gear progression is unpolished as it is - Overhaul it for the love of god, it´s not rocket science. Why can´t you Korean publishers ever get this right in your games? :(

There may be some valid points in there, but as a woman myself... big big no on about all of the "girls like this, girls dont like that" topics. I really couldnt find myself agreeing with even a single one of these points... So maybe dont generalise it to one gender, but maybe rather you and your friend group.

Sexist claptrap, all these issues affect males  and females equally. Some are hoarders, some are not. Many of your points are valid but the sexism reeks of stupidity.