a lot of it relies on one sole factor: diversity, which is something the rps here lack. like, a lot.

take a look at, i dunno, roleplaygateway. you got so many different genres just on the front page! then look back at rpg. let's see, 10 high school rps, 7 teenagers with superpowers, a whole lot of smut (with some furry smut sprinkled inbetween) and whatever the fuck advanced and nation rps are like.

it's just that a lot of the "big" gms - yknow, ones that constantly drag in tonnes of interest simply from saying the word roleplay - lack originality. it's the same bland formula, sometimes with a little twist or maybe even a slightly different formula, and not a lot of consideration for the people not into that sort of stuff.

at the same time, it's also that themes people are interested in are typically found in free (where, no offense, the russian kids on csgo can english better than that) or they're just hosted by bad gms/are full of bad players. i honestly have gotten more into gming than rp searching because of this.

this isn't to say less players is such a bad thing. a lot of it is that people's attention spans are getting wayyyy too short. hell, you get users who join, post once, then never show up ever again. poof. that's it.

i don't see the problem with having a smaller player base, so long as it doesn't get to the point where the site is completely barren, or there's like 3 people left who all rp at different levels.