Most users ever online was 447, 08-06-2008 at 05:09 PM. <-- all bots I bet I am interested in seeing the current average.
2.0 was the end of 2007. That would have been August 2008 (if it's American date), so mid summer holidays during 2.12. It probably was just bots to be honest. Empires was pretty busy back then, but not THAT busy. If anything, that was around the time all the moaning about the delay in the Orangebox port started.
Doesnt the stat count non registered users as well? There were a fuckton of these guys back in the day.
Wasn't that the date when the port to the Orange Box was announced? I don't think it is unrealistic to think those were mostly humans, since Empires was the hottest mod around at that time.