A Statistical Comparison of my LPs on Talking Time So Far

[Second Duke Revier]

My very first LP thread, my playthrough through the first three Mana games, started on December 25, 2024 and ended on March 12, 2025. It got 23000~ views so far, as well as an eclectic collection of thread participants, with as many as 19 different commentators! I'd say this is by far my most successful LP, without question.

After that, my Star Ocean 2 LP, which lasted from March 19, 2025 and ended at May 17, 2025. It obviously did worse, getting "only" 6000~ views and about 9 commentators. I wasn't too bothered by it, because hey, it's a niche game from a niche franchise that wasn't all that popular, even in its heyday.

But then comes the most curious case, my Final Fantasy Tactics LP. It started on July 22, 2025 and is still ongoing. In that time period it drew 11000~ views, but only 7 commentators. I don't understand the discrepancy here, I guess it's because there are people who are interested in Final Fantasy Tactics but don't want to comment in fears of spoiling the game too much? After all, Final Fantasy Tactics, unlike the other games I've LPed, has had its fair share of playthroughs and documentation, being decently popular for a tactics game (it's arguable how well documented any of the Mana games are, the franchise has always been fairly niche despite its long lifespan and multiple entries). Certainly it's something I find myself pondering about.

Anyhow, feel free to share your comments and insights on all of this if you found it interesting or worthwhile!

 

[Lokii]

Im reading the Tactics one but haven't commented because I haven't had anything to add.

But don’t worry about views and commenters, that’s the way to sorrow. You’ve made fun entertaining threads and that’s more than enough.

 

[Yimothy]

Yeah, back when I used to LP I concluded I was doing it for myself. Getting other thread participants was nice, but if I relied on them for satisfaction then putting all the work of an update in and getting nothing in response (as sometimes happened) would be crushing. I am a terrible commenter myself. I’ve read your tactics (or part of it, I’m behind now) and I have had star ocean open in a tab on my phone for months waiting for when I find the time (sorry), but I have not commented.

 

[Violentvixen]

I can say personally that I'm a huge Mana fan and your Mana LP had a lot of opportunities to give feedback/advice/lore dumps and it felt like the other commenters were learning too, I've just browsed the thread again quickly and there were a lot of people (including me) being reminded of stuff or curious about how it goes across multiple games in the series. I think there's just a lot more to potentially discuss when multiple games are in one LP.

I've only played FFT once so isn't a game I know as well and I'm not as much into Final Fantasy as so many others are on here. I think a lot of the questions so far in your LP are more about the systems and I truly don't remember them but assume someone else (or multiple someone elses) here has every class and spell in FFT memorized. Also the images in the FFT one are bigger so it's a littler harder to scroll through, but I didn't really notice that until now when reopening the Mana one so I don't think it's a huge deal.

And I wouldn't be surprised if other people are holding off looking at the LP because they plan to pickup the remake in a couple weeks.

 

[JBear]

Yeah, back when I used to LP I concluded I was doing it for myself. Getting other thread participants was nice, but if I relied on them for satisfaction then putting all the work of an update in and getting nothing in response (as sometimes happened) would be crushing.

Yeah, I was going to say exactly this. LP work is pretty thankless, broadly speaking. Screenshot LPs especially, as an increasingly dying breed. Thanks for keeping the dream alive!

But even now, I can go back and re-read my old LP updates and smile to myself and lose track of time. I did that shit for me!

That said, I'd be lying if I claimed to have not kept an eye on viewing and participation numbers back when they were active. The older forum gave even more tools to obsessively diagnose engagement! But that way madness lies.

 

[Mogri]

Yeah, the advice to ignore view counts is both correct and worthless; you're the only one who can tell yourself it doesn't matter.

I enjoy LPs, and so I make a point of commenting on them more than I otherwise would, because I know from my time in the driver's seat that it often feels like nobody's reading.


@JBear I've had the idea for probably a couple of years now to create a "best of the archives" thread, but I think my contributions to the thread would largely be my own LPs, so the thread felt self-aggrandizing. Now, if someone else made the thread, I'd be more than happy to plug my 7th Saga and FFMQ LPs.

There's a lot of good stuff in those archives...

 

[Falselogic]

I never even thought to check the stats for my LPs! All this time I could have been obsessing and getting depressed over metrics?!

 

[Olli]

Without anything to back it up, I'm also guessing that forum attendance is slowly declining, so comparing older numbers to newer ones can be misleading.

 

[Second Duke Revier]

I mean, it's fairly well known that forums and written LPs both have been on a decline (albeit a rather overstated one), thanks to the rise of Discord and Youtube/Twitch streams. But that's not really my question, my question is more how did I rack up 11k-ish views on my ongoing FFT LP without getting a comparable number of commentators?

I guess those views are coming precisely because of the announcement and upcoming release of the FFT remaster, which is making it more favorable to search algorithms and pulling in a large "silent" audience who read it out of curiosity, as it is a "modern"-ish account of someone playing the game relatively fresh, in contrast to other FFT LPs which seem to start from a standpoint of perfectly knowing the game and teaching others how to play it.

 

[jpfriction]

I think Bongo mentioned the forums have been getting hammered by LLM bots recently too, which may be skewing view counts.

 

[Torzelbaum]

I think a lot of the questions so far in your LP are more about the systems and I truly don't remember them but assume someone else (or multiple someone elses) here has every class and spell in FFT memorized

I have not memorized that. (But maybe Mogri has.)

 

[Mogri]

I have not memorized that. (But maybe Mogri has.)

 

[Second Duke Revier]

Hah! Nice Tactics Ogre reference there.