PWO's brain died long time ago. What do you see these days are the twitches caused by nerve reaction. Well it passed a lot of time, people really tried and had hopes. Can't expect anything else with such staff culture PWO has. One thing is pretty easy to figure out. PWO is not in this situation due to players, it's due to staffs way of managing the game. Players can't do such damage.
I remember when PWO had constantly full server years ago and I remember it when it had 900 players all the time. However, staff were a bit different. You had like few staff that always knew how to interact with players. None of those are around here anymore. Some of them might left but they are too much into staff culture.
Another thing is staff not wanting to leave. If thousands of people want you to be gone than there is a reason for it. You either failed as staff member or you don't fit. Players were never able to decide who will stay or who will go. Another reason why you see today an single minded circle of people. For example Bluerise. He is dedicated staff and will work on things. But he is missing several things needed to have proper relationship with this community. lack of socialization and pursuing its own belief despite people addressed many times about what is going on.
This caused a lot people to leave, not only players, staffs even. PWO changed handful of admins while others don't feel like idling around under these cirsumstances. Eventually you only have ring of people that think same. And another bad thing that can happen is people that are about to become staff or they are already staff but they are suppressed and limited. What they can do is only watching PWO chaning, on good or better doesnt matter. They still can't do much. When you look at staff as if they are one person you will get clearer picture. With all this time community formed into people who want changes, suckups (most of them know **** about game or they are IRC clowns supporting the fault and also staff as whole. With many years people were flushed out from staff leaving only those ones who thinks the same. This is closing doors to people who want to work.
And I say above, if thousands want you to leave then you have to leave or else you get what you have today. Bluerise did a lot yes but what he did past 2 years is rather alarming only pissing people of. It was always about them thinking that players have wrong view while they have the best possible. Those staff being there tells you how much people care about this game, starting from Xanatus. Not quite sure if whole thing is funny for staff but if that number of people want you to be gone then you are not wanted and everything you do will be spat on...such as playerdex. Spending 2 years to have few more features while you deleted ingame mart just to have this crappy one. If this is place where you train your coding skills then you will never be a good programer. You said that this is non profit game and that you care about people. so tell me why are you still here if you care about people? But wont bother too much people already knows who is who...explains this situatoin a lot.
Regarding new client and updates. You can have everything ready over night...every possible update but there will still be one big problem and that is certain staff still being staff not wanting to leave. Remember this game had no updates 2 years ago but it had people. In time hope simply wore of. It like giving Ferrari to Christiano Ronaldo...nice car have everything but dumb idiot smashes into wall with it or he wants to change its rims several zoll smaller then original ones. Dam.. it can be even converted to home for chickens to lay legs no one else will eat except themselves.
Maths simple. 2008 till 2015...more than 6 years. No new regions, no new Pokemon, loss of players, bad staff culture, updates taken away, features taken away, No new stuff in token store...players treated like animals, server cap was increased just to be reduced to several times again(it looks better when you check server status, percentage is greater so people think that someone is actually playing). All those things have changed on WORSE and we all know that. Those are the simple facts you see everyday...all those changed but some staff never changed. Guess we know who is to blame now?
Bluerise was playing in 2008 and shortly after he got MOD position together with other MODs who got promoted that december. Game needed MODs back then. He was only native english speaker together with Chelion who got position back then. He was working on wiki porting forum guides back then and doing edits. Shortly after he was given full control on wiki by shadowwolf I think. Shortly after he was promoted to a GM as Arenya or Nee gave few good words for him. Being only person who had some knowledge how to manage web services and similar he got admin position. Crenel promoted him. All that time spent on wiki and changed few ranks yet not able to learn how to interact with people is alarming. When you have people to push you and vouch for you,getting rank becomes like getting a candy. I could see a lot other people being rejected and eventually they gone from PWO. This was never supposed to be Bluerises staff or Bluerises game. However, you had few people on key positions who felt powerful for having their boots licked to support the ideology and what you see today is pretty much the indicator of how system works.
I dont think New client will be released before 2016-2017, wich i think is enough time to make an end for this game 
