I wouldn't go as far as calling the bundled Easy diffiiculties bad though.
And you won't be able to stop new players from looking for unranked maps of their favorite song and getting served some trash.
I tend to agree with you that in many cases Easy and Normal diffs nowadays aren't as good as they should be but the amount of Easy diffs that is in fact bad enough to be noticed by new players is still extremely low. Personally I played hundreds of Easy and Normal diffs, many of them multiple times and I had in no way the experience that they sucked and that I was lost or anything. Every map was a new challenge and I took them on. Either you got the mindset or not - eventually you will tire out even with a career mode. Getting good at osu! is a massive time investment, even more so if you get in touch with the community on top of it.
You say the community interaction is strong and unique and although I agree with you on this, it is also exactly the thing that pushes people into the arms of Tillerino.
People get to know about it from mouth-to-mouth conversation in #multiplayer or #osu, from YT and livestreams. It is ultimately what most people joining care about the most as they get to know osu! from that famous livestreamer's reaction video to some Cookiezi 800pp replay or wherever.
Admittedly, ppv2 is a different topic and it has been pointed out in various discussions that despite its upsides it also carries some terrifying downsides to the long-term development of the game's content and its community with it.
Last but not least: Is osu! desperate to grow its playerbase?
Judging from the numbers on the "Online users for past 24h" probably not as it indicates there are at least 50k people playing osu! on a sort of regular basis.
If you can't be arsed to look, there's a link to osu!academy right on the download page.
If the community is really the most valuable thing in this game (and I think it is) osu! should give more incentives to get in touch with the community. A career mode does not achieve that - rather the opposite if you ask me as it feeds on the method of no-brain playing and not paying attention to anything around.
And you won't be able to stop new players from looking for unranked maps of their favorite song and getting served some trash.
I tend to agree with you that in many cases Easy and Normal diffs nowadays aren't as good as they should be but the amount of Easy diffs that is in fact bad enough to be noticed by new players is still extremely low. Personally I played hundreds of Easy and Normal diffs, many of them multiple times and I had in no way the experience that they sucked and that I was lost or anything. Every map was a new challenge and I took them on. Either you got the mindset or not - eventually you will tire out even with a career mode. Getting good at osu! is a massive time investment, even more so if you get in touch with the community on top of it.
You say the community interaction is strong and unique and although I agree with you on this, it is also exactly the thing that pushes people into the arms of Tillerino.
People get to know about it from mouth-to-mouth conversation in #multiplayer or #osu, from YT and livestreams. It is ultimately what most people joining care about the most as they get to know osu! from that famous livestreamer's reaction video to some Cookiezi 800pp replay or wherever.
Admittedly, ppv2 is a different topic and it has been pointed out in various discussions that despite its upsides it also carries some terrifying downsides to the long-term development of the game's content and its community with it.
Last but not least: Is osu! desperate to grow its playerbase?
Judging from the numbers on the "Online users for past 24h" probably not as it indicates there are at least 50k people playing osu! on a sort of regular basis.
If you can't be arsed to look, there's a link to osu!academy right on the download page.
If the community is really the most valuable thing in this game (and I think it is) osu! should give more incentives to get in touch with the community. A career mode does not achieve that - rather the opposite if you ask me as it feeds on the method of no-brain playing and not paying attention to anything around.