[Gang]

I think I've seen playerbase raise from 20 people online to 150 and then suddenly fall back to 20 enough times during past few years to realize that there can never be one single reason for this... Winter, some people got UO nostalgic, some kept playing through these years.. Eru made up a lot of interesting stuff, which indeed attracted people to the server. Hunter slayer, The shrines, Mercenary camp, quests to raise skills rather than only AFK macroing like it's done on almost every sphere server around... Server had a lot gameplay improvements to offer. The improvements that servers in the past could only dream about. This server was bugless (compared to the sphere servers that is.. I know people tend to complain a lot about the bugs lately, but the point is most just forgot how buggy it was on 51a.), because it was also properly scripted, which intook most of thre time.
So, what I'm trying to say is.. It's indeed an old game, and people get bored of it.. To keep somewhat decent playerbase playing the game they all have beaten multiple times already you have to keep working on the server non stop... Adding quests, items, updating functionality, fixing bugs... And getting fun meanwhile.. As soon as it's no longer fun or you get less freetime/better ways to spend it you start and get inactive...