Planetside 2 will suffer from the same population problems as the original.

[EVILoHOMER]

This is one thing that I don't get why SOE never tackled and that is the population differences between peak and off peak playing times. I've seen this so much in beta where the game just is dead throughout the day and only picks up during peak times. This is going to be a really big issue because it causes people to just not bother playing. If you constantly have to say "I cannot play until peak time" then you'll just get frustrated and fed up.

Sadly the issue isn't low population due to the beta because as the population increases there will be more servers and even more people will be spread out during off peak times which just increases the problem and causes some server to be ghost towns. In a standard MMORPG it doesn't matter so much, usually you want it to be quieter so you can kill the boss that is usually being camped, however Planetside is all about the big battles.

I just feel like SOE need a dynamic way of merging servers when the population gets too low to keep it high at all times. I also feel like the whole server system is bad, it's never been a good thing and they should have just gone for one big regional server like EU, US and Oceanic and then placed you around automatically. Obviously you can implement a system where you're put with your Outfit or Squad so it isn't an issue when playing with friends.