100% of the personal story episodes that are in the game now were in at launch.
This is misleading, as the "Living Story" is the continuation of the "Personal Story"
But there was 0% Living Story at Launch as there is now.
They Added Elite Spec. Mounts for PvE Mounts for WvW Mastery Lines - For Several Different Game modes, not just the Expansions Reward Tracks for PvP and WvW. A full new Set of Legendary Weapons. Legendary Trinkets Legendary Armor Raids New Fractal Levels Edge of the Mists - for WvW a Whole new WvW Map Several PvP Maps a Whole new PvP Game Mode Seasonal Festivals Mad King Wintersday Adventure Box Queens Jubilee
So they have been kinda busy.
I even ran Questionnaire on their Old Forums, and asked what players would pay for.
Damn near 30% said they would spend money to have better festivals.. other top contenders were more Living Story and More Dungeons.. and the ability to kill Braham.
I admit, they really dropped the ball canceling Dungeons, they also didn't do themselves any favors putting in Raids.
But they have been busy.. and have definitely put in enough work to be asking for money for it.
If that were a summary of what some pre-release game did over the last six months, then you'd say, hey, they're making good progress. For that plus about half as much content as the game had at launch to be a summary of what they've done over the past 6 1/2 years is considerably less impressive.
I'm not claiming that ArenaNet is running a scam, or something like that. Kind of the opposite, in fact. If people have actively been playing your game as much as they could for six years after launch, and all that you've added for them to buy in that time is two relatively small expansions that cost $30 each, that doesn't seem like a way for ArenaNet to make that much money. Ordinarily, you'd like for your huge fans who love your game and play it a ton to pay you more money than that.
And that's to say nothing of the people who play for a month and then quit. With the base game now free, why should they pay anything at all?
I'm somewhat skeptical of living world content, as back when I played, it was catastrophically awful, and basically accounted for a negative amount of content. It's not just that the living world junk was awful in itself. They'd drop it on top of something else to wreck some other content that you wanted to play that day, so that you'd have to either work around it or just leave and come back in two weeks. The wiki descriptions make it sound like the newer Living World content is a totally different mechanic that just happens to share a name with the early ("season 1") version for some inexplicable reason.
100% of the personal story episodes that are in the game now were in at launch.
This is misleading, as the "Living Story" is the continuation of the "Personal Story"
But there was 0% Living Story at Launch as there is now.
They Added Elite Spec. Mounts for PvE Mounts for WvW Mastery Lines - For Several Different Game modes, not just the Expansions Reward Tracks for PvP and WvW. A full new Set of Legendary Weapons. Legendary Trinkets Legendary Armor Raids New Fractal Levels Edge of the Mists - for WvW a Whole new WvW Map Several PvP Maps a Whole new PvP Game Mode Seasonal Festivals Mad King Wintersday Adventure Box Queens Jubilee
So they have been kinda busy.
I even ran Questionnaire on their Old Forums, and asked what players would pay for.
Damn near 30% said they would spend money to have better festivals.. other top contenders were more Living Story and More Dungeons.. and the ability to kill Braham.
I admit, they really dropped the ball canceling Dungeons, they also didn't do themselves any favors putting in Raids.
But they have been busy.. and have definitely put in enough work to be asking for money for it.
If that were a summary of what some pre-release game did over the last six months, then you'd say, hey, they're making good progress. For that plus about half as much content as the game had at launch to be a summary of what they've done over the past 6 1/2 years is considerably less impressive.
I'm not claiming that ArenaNet is running a scam, or something like that. Kind of the opposite, in fact. If people have actively been playing your game as much as they could for six years after launch, and all that you've added for them to buy in that time is two relatively small expansions that cost $30 each, that doesn't seem like a way for ArenaNet to make that much money. Ordinarily, you'd like for your huge fans who love your game and play it a ton to pay you more money than that.
And that's to say nothing of the people who play for a month and then quit. With the base game now free, why should they pay anything at all?
I'm somewhat skeptical of living world content, as back when I played, it was catastrophically awful, and basically accounted for a negative amount of content. It's not just that the living world junk was awful in itself. They'd drop it on top of something else to wreck some other content that you wanted to play that day, so that you'd have to either work around it or just leave and come back in two weeks. The wiki descriptions make it sound like the newer Living World content is a totally different mechanic that just happens to share a name with the early ("season 1") version for some inexplicable reason.
Living World seasons 3-4 are completely different from the season 1 you were familiar with.
Season 1 was all about changing existing content. Little of it was permanent. It was mostly comprised of open world events that might sometimes change or shape a map (with the biggest example being the destroyed Tower of Nightmares in Kessex Hills).
Seasons 3 and 4 are all about addition. Every episode comes with a new map of considerable size, alongside multiple story instances that push a personal story narrative AND a potential fractal and/or raid wing addition. The primary difference between the living story instances and the personal story ones is that the choices of the personal story are replaced by a single higher-quality narrative. The presentation has also improved considerably, with the awkward conversation backdrops being replaced by real time ingame dialogue that works much better.
Basically, ever since Season 3 started, Guild Wars 2 has been getting content at a much faster rate than at any other point in its post-launch lifespan. It hasn't been on maintenance mode. What remains to be seen is whether they can keep the pace now.
If that were a summary of what some pre-release game did over the last six months, then you'd say, hey, they're making good progress. For that plus about half as much content as the game had at launch to be a summary of what they've done over the past 6 1/2 years is considerably less impressive.
I'm not claiming that ArenaNet is running a scam, or something like that. Kind of the opposite, in fact. If people have actively been playing your game as much as they could for six years after launch, and all that you've added for them to buy in that time is two relatively small expansions that cost $30 each, that doesn't seem like a way for ArenaNet to make that much money. Ordinarily, you'd like for your huge fans who love your game and play it a ton to pay you more money than that.
And that's to say nothing of the people who play for a month and then quit. With the base game now free, why should they pay anything at all?
I'm somewhat skeptical of living world content, as back when I played, it was catastrophically awful, and basically accounted for a negative amount of content. It's not just that the living world junk was awful in itself. They'd drop it on top of something else to wreck some other content that you wanted to play that day, so that you'd have to either work around it or just leave and come back in two weeks. The wiki descriptions make it sound like the newer Living World content is a totally different mechanic that just happens to share a name with the early ("season 1") version for some inexplicable reason.
Living World seasons 3-4 are completely different from the season 1 you were familiar with.
Season 1 was all about changing existing content. Little of it was permanent. It was mostly comprised of open world events that might sometimes change or shape a map (with the biggest example being the destroyed Tower of Nightmares in Kessex Hills).
Seasons 3 and 4 are all about addition. Every episode comes with a new map of considerable size, alongside multiple story instances that push a personal story narrative AND a potential fractal and/or raid wing addition. The primary difference between the living story instances and the personal story ones is that the choices of the personal story are replaced by a single higher-quality narrative. The presentation has also improved considerably, with the awkward conversation backdrops being replaced by real time ingame dialogue that works much better.
Basically, ever since Season 3 started, Guild Wars 2 has been getting content at a much faster rate than at any other point in its post-launch lifespan. It hasn't been on maintenance mode. What remains to be seen is whether they can keep the pace now.
That's good news, certainly. But why reuse the old name for a totally different mechanic?
If that were a summary of what some pre-release game did over the last six months, then you'd say, hey, they're making good progress. For that plus about half as much content as the game had at launch to be a summary of what they've done over the past 6 1/2 years is considerably less impressive.
I'm not claiming that ArenaNet is running a scam, or something like that. Kind of the opposite, in fact. If people have actively been playing your game as much as they could for six years after launch, and all that you've added for them to buy in that time is two relatively small expansions that cost $30 each, that doesn't seem like a way for ArenaNet to make that much money. Ordinarily, you'd like for your huge fans who love your game and play it a ton to pay you more money than that.
And that's to say nothing of the people who play for a month and then quit. With the base game now free, why should they pay anything at all?
I'm somewhat skeptical of living world content, as back when I played, it was catastrophically awful, and basically accounted for a negative amount of content. It's not just that the living world junk was awful in itself. They'd drop it on top of something else to wreck some other content that you wanted to play that day, so that you'd have to either work around it or just leave and come back in two weeks. The wiki descriptions make it sound like the newer Living World content is a totally different mechanic that just happens to share a name with the early ("season 1") version for some inexplicable reason.
Living World seasons 3-4 are completely different from the season 1 you were familiar with.
Season 1 was all about changing existing content. Little of it was permanent. It was mostly comprised of open world events that might sometimes change or shape a map (with the biggest example being the destroyed Tower of Nightmares in Kessex Hills).
Seasons 3 and 4 are all about addition. Every episode comes with a new map of considerable size, alongside multiple story instances that push a personal story narrative AND a potential fractal and/or raid wing addition. The primary difference between the living story instances and the personal story ones is that the choices of the personal story are replaced by a single higher-quality narrative. The presentation has also improved considerably, with the awkward conversation backdrops being replaced by real time ingame dialogue that works much better.
Basically, ever since Season 3 started, Guild Wars 2 has been getting content at a much faster rate than at any other point in its post-launch lifespan. It hasn't been on maintenance mode. What remains to be seen is whether they can keep the pace now.
That's good news, certainly. But why reuse the old name for a totally different mechanic?
Probably for the simple reason that living world is a good brand name and conveys what they want to convey - that the world is moving forward. I doubt they've thought much about it beyond that.
I don't much care for the new team of NPCs. They never should have killed off Eir. I feel like a babysitter. I get that they have flaws and that is needed for character development. But except for Marjory, they all make me feel like I am leading a high school outing for the short-bus class. At least they gave me Ritlock.
Im confused why anyone thinks that HoT or PoF were mistakes. They probably caused the biggest spike in revenue, added the MOST content by far compared to any LS episode, as well as other systems such as elite specs, mounts, gliders, etc.
Expansions are what brought this game back from the brink of dying.
If that were a summary of what some pre-release game did over the last six months, then you'd say, hey, they're making good progress. For that plus about half as much content as the game had at launch to be a summary of what they've done over the past 6 1/2 years is considerably less impressive.
I'm not claiming that ArenaNet is running a scam, or something like that. Kind of the opposite, in fact. If people have actively been playing your game as much as they could for six years after launch, and all that you've added for them to buy in that time is two relatively small expansions that cost $30 each, that doesn't seem like a way for ArenaNet to make that much money. Ordinarily, you'd like for your huge fans who love your game and play it a ton to pay you more money than that.
And that's to say nothing of the people who play for a month and then quit. With the base game now free, why should they pay anything at all?
I'm somewhat skeptical of living world content, as back when I played, it was catastrophically awful, and basically accounted for a negative amount of content. It's not just that the living world junk was awful in itself. They'd drop it on top of something else to wreck some other content that you wanted to play that day, so that you'd have to either work around it or just leave and come back in two weeks. The wiki descriptions make it sound like the newer Living World content is a totally different mechanic that just happens to share a name with the early ("season 1") version for some inexplicable reason.
Living World seasons 3-4 are completely different from the season 1 you were familiar with.
Season 1 was all about changing existing content. Little of it was permanent. It was mostly comprised of open world events that might sometimes change or shape a map (with the biggest example being the destroyed Tower of Nightmares in Kessex Hills).
Seasons 3 and 4 are all about addition. Every episode comes with a new map of considerable size, alongside multiple story instances that push a personal story narrative AND a potential fractal and/or raid wing addition. The primary difference between the living story instances and the personal story ones is that the choices of the personal story are replaced by a single higher-quality narrative. The presentation has also improved considerably, with the awkward conversation backdrops being replaced by real time ingame dialogue that works much better.
Basically, ever since Season 3 started, Guild Wars 2 has been getting content at a much faster rate than at any other point in its post-launch lifespan. It hasn't been on maintenance mode. What remains to be seen is whether they can keep the pace now.
That's good news, certainly. But why reuse the old name for a totally different mechanic?
Probably for the simple reason that living world is a good brand name and conveys what they want to convey - that the world is moving forward. I doubt they've thought much about it beyond that.
The Living World is a great brand name, brand informs so much of what companies do you are probably right.
100% of the personal story episodes that are in the game now were in at launch.
This is misleading, as the "Living Story" is the continuation of the "Personal Story"
But there was 0% Living Story at Launch as there is now.
They Added Elite Spec. Mounts for PvE Mounts for WvW Mastery Lines - For Several Different Game modes, not just the Expansions Reward Tracks for PvP and WvW. A full new Set of Legendary Weapons. Legendary Trinkets Legendary Armor Raids New Fractal Levels Edge of the Mists - for WvW a Whole new WvW Map Several PvP Maps a Whole new PvP Game Mode Seasonal Festivals Mad King Wintersday Adventure Box Queens Jubilee
So they have been kinda busy.
I even ran Questionnaire on their Old Forums, and asked what players would pay for.
Damn near 30% said they would spend money to have better festivals.. other top contenders were more Living Story and More Dungeons.. and the ability to kill Braham.
I admit, they really dropped the ball canceling Dungeons, they also didn't do themselves any favors putting in Raids.
But they have been busy.. and have definitely put in enough work to be asking for money for it.
If that were a summary of what some pre-release game did over the last six months, then you'd say, hey, they're making good progress. For that plus about half as much content as the game had at launch to be a summary of what they've done over the past 6 1/2 years is considerably less impressive.
I'm not claiming that ArenaNet is running a scam, or something like that. Kind of the opposite, in fact. If people have actively been playing your game as much as they could for six years after launch, and all that you've added for them to buy in that time is two relatively small expansions that cost $30 each, that doesn't seem like a way for ArenaNet to make that much money. Ordinarily, you'd like for your huge fans who love your game and play it a ton to pay you more money than that.
And that's to say nothing of the people who play for a month and then quit. With the base game now free, why should they pay anything at all?
I'm somewhat skeptical of living world content, as back when I played, it was catastrophically awful, and basically accounted for a negative amount of content. It's not just that the living world junk was awful in itself. They'd drop it on top of something else to wreck some other content that you wanted to play that day, so that you'd have to either work around it or just leave and come back in two weeks. The wiki descriptions make it sound like the newer Living World content is a totally different mechanic that just happens to share a name with the early ("season 1") version for some inexplicable reason.
While @Aeander has address the issues with the Living World, I'll address the other point of content overall.
The problem with just pumping out content is that it has the effect of spreading out the existing player base, which is not what you want to happen in a game as it gets older, you want the Starting Zones to remain populated, you want the new players to see that the old players are still around, that this place is active.
So content addition is a risky game of giving players enough so that the world feels vast, but not too much so that the world feels dead.
If they just kept pumping out maps, and spreading the players out more and more, all they would accomplish is making the game overall feel more and more dead, even if the population had remained constant or even grown.
Also, to be honest, the Core GW2, game was one of the best games I ever played, it was really set up top notch as an MMO, so, it's hard to improve upon something that starts that strong, their miserable screw up called HoT showed that clearly.
But to each their own. I am not saying that what they are doing now is a good thing, or that they are not a sinking ship at this point.
I am just saying.. they have been working on the game and putting stuff out.
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
Im confused why anyone thinks that HoT or PoF were mistakes. They probably caused the biggest spike in revenue, added the MOST content by far compared to any LS episode, as well as other systems such as elite specs, mounts, gliders, etc.
Expansions are what brought this game back from the brink of dying.
HoT brought a Pre-Expansion spike in Revenue, boosting sales up to 32 million for a single quarter, Keep in mind this was Pre-Orders, so this was all purchased on the faith in the product and the good will that their Core game had with their player base.
Previous to HoT, they had been hovering between 18 - 20 million a quarter, Hardly anywhere near the brink of dying, in fact they were doing quite well.
After HoT, their sales dropped to average 12 million a quarter, causing them a loss of roughly 6 million a quarter, for estimated loss of 30 million over the course of time between HoT and PoF.
PoF offred very little in the way of a spike at all, with only 18 million (Less than the average Pre-HoT quarterly sales) , with almost a negabel amount of pre-orders, which means that PoF proved very clearly that HoT cost them a huge amount of good will among their player base.
In short, HoT alone set them back around 15 million and permanently damaged their reputation among their player base.
That is why people say HoT sucked... because it did.
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
That's good news, certainly. But why reuse the old name for a totally different mechanic?
Probably for the simple reason that living world is a good brand name and conveys what they want to convey - that the world is moving forward. I doubt they've thought much about it beyond that.
The Living World is a great brand name, brand informs so much of what companies do you are probably right.
From the perspective of people who have played the game recently, that might be right. From the perspective of someone who played for a while not that long after launch and has been away from the game for years, that's wildly wrong. That they talked so much about Living World after I left gave me the impression that their focus was doubling down on the biggest mistake that the company ever made. It was only spending some hours of wiki research that made it look like it was a totally different mechanic that now means adding new, permanent content rather than its old meaning of temporarily breaking old content. Most people aren't going to do those hours of wiki research about a game that they quit years ago, and will assume that your new usage of a term means the same as what it used to mean when you used it years ago.
If you're going to do something new, you don't want to tag it with a name that has strongly negative connotations because of what the name has been applied to before. Living World probably means something very different to people who have been actively playing season 4 than to those who have only ever seen season 1. If your goal is to get the latter to come back and give your name another look, it's about as big of a marketing blunder as having a typical bag mechanic and calling it "loot boxes" in a game that doesn't have anything analogous to what other games mean by loot boxes. It's a fairly descriptive name in isolation, but has connotations that you really want to avoid.
That's good news, certainly. But why reuse the old name for a totally different mechanic?
Probably for the simple reason that living world is a good brand name and conveys what they want to convey - that the world is moving forward. I doubt they've thought much about it beyond that.
The Living World is a great brand name, brand informs so much of what companies do you are probably right.
From the perspective of people who have played the game recently, that might be right. From the perspective of someone who played for a while not that long after launch and has been away from the game for years, that's wildly wrong. That they talked so much about Living World after I left gave me the impression that their focus was doubling down on the biggest mistake that the company ever made. It was only spending some hours of wiki research that made it look like it was a totally different mechanic that now means adding new, permanent content rather than its old meaning of temporarily breaking old content. Most people aren't going to do those hours of wiki research about a game that they quit years ago, and will assume that your new usage of a term means the same as what it used to mean when you used it years ago.
If you're going to do something new, you don't want to tag it with a name that has strongly negative connotations because of what the name has been applied to before. Living World probably means something very different to people who have been actively playing season 4 than to those who have only ever seen season 1. If your goal is to get the latter to come back and give your name another look, it's about as big of a marketing blunder as having a typical bag mechanic and calling it "loot boxes" in a game that doesn't have anything analogous to what other games mean by loot boxes. It's a fairly descriptive name in isolation, but has connotations that you really want to avoid.
I think they have given up getting their Alienated player base back, and just trying to get the most out of what they have currently.
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
#1 fail of 99% of these mmorpg developers >>>>SINGLE player design content.I "get it"if your game doesn't have a good core of actual MMO gamer's then yeah you'll have to turn your game into a single player game and still charge them money as if it were a MMO.
Likely heard me say it before>>>login screens are nothing more than a means to operate a cash shop.This type of game should be purchased once and that is the original design of their GW1 and 2 were supposed to be.
To me it is simply a red flag the developer is not very good at developing a MMO and this without arguing over weather i think the content they do have is even RPG worthy.
If you are any good at your job,you can CREATE good enough content that people WANT to group.This was Anet marketing ploy from the very first day,trying to scoff at everything mmorpg devs are doing wrong and they would fix that.
HELLO..Anet are you home,creating single player game content is NOT how you fix the MMO side of gaming.I know MANY people will again say stuff like "i am so glad i can solo this content"again i "get it".Another thing AUTO flagging you into a group is again not fixing anything,LAZY work.
So if you want to be considered a real MMO a real rpg you have to run your design theories as such.I would NEVER listen to some person who has ZERO patience and NEEDS to run this content RIGHT now !!!Point being,of course running in a group takes time to build but there are tools to speed that up and the way i did it,simply stand at the entrance to a dungeon or nearby the content and ask to join the group.I am not saying EVERY last piece of the design has to be grouping so don't even go there,i am saying if you are going to push this living story idea over and over,DO IT RIGHT and rather than just content to do,make it fun,interesting>>>UNIQUE if your capable.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
#1 fail of 99% of these mmorpg developers >>>>SINGLE player design content.I "get it"if your game doesn't have a good core of actual MMO gamer's then yeah you'll have to turn your game into a single player game and still charge them money as if it were a MMO.
Likely heard me say it before>>>login screens are nothing more than a means to operate a cash shop.This type of game should be purchased once and that is the original design of their GW1 and 2 were supposed to be.
To me it is simply a red flag the developer is not very good at developing a MMO and this without arguing over weather i think the content they do have is even RPG worthy.
If you are any good at your job,you can CREATE good enough content that people WANT to group.This was Anet marketing ploy from the very first day,trying to scoff at everything mmorpg devs are doing wrong and they would fix that.
HELLO..Anet are you home,creating single player game content is NOT how you fix the MMO side of gaming.I know MANY people will again say stuff like "i am so glad i can solo this content"again i "get it".Another thing AUTO flagging you into a group is again not fixing anything,LAZY work.
So if you want to be considered a real MMO a real rpg you have to run your design theories as such.I would NEVER listen to some person who has ZERO patience and NEEDS to run this content RIGHT now !!!Point being,of course running in a group takes time to build but there are tools to speed that up and the way i did it,simply stand at the entrance to a dungeon or nearby the content and ask to join the group.I am not saying EVERY last piece of the design has to be grouping so don't even go there,i am saying if you are going to push this living story idea over and over,DO IT RIGHT and rather than just content to do,make it fun,interesting>>>UNIQUE if your capable.
Actually, I think GW2's Open World content was by far one of the best multiplayer systems out there.
Unlike group based content, like Dungeons, and Raids, that force you be stuck with a group of people who may or may not be total assholes, or build a whole static, so you don't have to deal PUGs and thus avoid dealing with other players (Which is not really any better than soloing to be honest as far as MMO's go) GW2 really set out a true gem with their Open World Content made it so that players could and would gather together to do massive events like World Bosses simply because it was convenient, profitable, and fun to do so.
This was truly one of the best parts of the game, and such a unique hook when the game was made that it was this was a massive sale point.
Later with the addition of zones like Dry Top and the Silver Wastes they added in the idea of Meta Events which were larger, more involved events that anyone contribute to and get involved in, and this was a massive boon to their social gaming.
They later made this more complex and convoluted with HoT, and it did not go well for them, with only like 2 of the 4 zones being populated with players getting involved with the Meta, mainly Dragon Stand and Auric Basin, with VB being all but ignored for their Meta, and TD being it's own private hell.
In that regard, GW2 was one of the most Multiplayer games out there, as private groups could not hide away in their little instances, feeling all better and more superior to everyone else. Then you know, they put in a bunch of instance based content so players could hide away with their statics and feel all superior to everyone else, and it soiled their game.
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
#1 fail of 99% of these mmorpg developers >>>>SINGLE player design content.I "get it"if your game doesn't have a good core of actual MMO gamer's then yeah you'll have to turn your game into a single player game and still charge them money as if it were a MMO.
Likely heard me say it before>>>login screens are nothing more than a means to operate a cash shop.This type of game should be purchased once and that is the original design of their GW1 and 2 were supposed to be.
To me it is simply a red flag the developer is not very good at developing a MMO and this without arguing over weather i think the content they do have is even RPG worthy.
If you are any good at your job,you can CREATE good enough content that people WANT to group.This was Anet marketing ploy from the very first day,trying to scoff at everything mmorpg devs are doing wrong and they would fix that.
HELLO..Anet are you home,creating single player game content is NOT how you fix the MMO side of gaming.I know MANY people will again say stuff like "i am so glad i can solo this content"again i "get it".Another thing AUTO flagging you into a group is again not fixing anything,LAZY work.
So if you want to be considered a real MMO a real rpg you have to run your design theories as such.I would NEVER listen to some person who has ZERO patience and NEEDS to run this content RIGHT now !!!Point being,of course running in a group takes time to build but there are tools to speed that up and the way i did it,simply stand at the entrance to a dungeon or nearby the content and ask to join the group.I am not saying EVERY last piece of the design has to be grouping so don't even go there,i am saying if you are going to push this living story idea over and over,DO IT RIGHT and rather than just content to do,make it fun,interesting>>>UNIQUE if your capable.
Actually, I think GW2's Open World content was by far one of the best multiplayer systems out there.
Unlike group based content, like Dungeons, and Raids, that force you be stuck with a group of people who may or may not be total assholes, or build a whole static, so you don't have to deal PUGs and thus avoid dealing with other players (Which is not really any better than soloing to be honest as far as MMO's go) GW2 really set out a true gem with their Open World Content made it so that players could and would gather together to do massive events like World Bosses simply because it was convenient, profitable, and fun to do so.
This was truly one of the best parts of the game, and such a unique hook when the game was made that it was this was a massive sale point.
Later with the addition of zones like Dry Top and the Silver Wastes they added in the idea of Meta Events which were larger, more involved events that anyone contribute to and get involved in, and this was a massive boon to their social gaming.
They later made this more complex and convoluted with HoT, and it did not go well for them, with only like 2 of the 4 zones being populated with players getting involved with the Meta, mainly Dragon Stand and Auric Basin, with VB being all but ignored for their Meta, and TD being it's own private hell.
In that regard, GW2 was one of the most Multiplayer games out there, as private groups could not hide away in their little instances, feeling all better and more superior to everyone else. Then you know, they put in a bunch of instance based content so players could hide away with their statics and feel all superior to everyone else, and it soiled their game.
Guild Wars 2's open-world multiplayer content sounded nice in theory, but it didn't work very well in practice. The problem was that it basically turned into, if you had enough players, you'd win and it was completely trivial. And if you didn't, you'd lose and it was impossible. The band in which it mattered what the players actually did was pretty small. That makes following the crowd around into the optimal strategy, which is completely stupid.
#1 fail of 99% of these mmorpg developers >>>>SINGLE player design content.I "get it"if your game doesn't have a good core of actual MMO gamer's then yeah you'll have to turn your game into a single player game and still charge them money as if it were a MMO.
Likely heard me say it before>>>login screens are nothing more than a means to operate a cash shop.This type of game should be purchased once and that is the original design of their GW1 and 2 were supposed to be.
To me it is simply a red flag the developer is not very good at developing a MMO and this without arguing over weather i think the content they do have is even RPG worthy.
If you are any good at your job,you can CREATE good enough content that people WANT to group.This was Anet marketing ploy from the very first day,trying to scoff at everything mmorpg devs are doing wrong and they would fix that.
HELLO..Anet are you home,creating single player game content is NOT how you fix the MMO side of gaming.I know MANY people will again say stuff like "i am so glad i can solo this content"again i "get it".Another thing AUTO flagging you into a group is again not fixing anything,LAZY work.
So if you want to be considered a real MMO a real rpg you have to run your design theories as such.I would NEVER listen to some person who has ZERO patience and NEEDS to run this content RIGHT now !!!Point being,of course running in a group takes time to build but there are tools to speed that up and the way i did it,simply stand at the entrance to a dungeon or nearby the content and ask to join the group.I am not saying EVERY last piece of the design has to be grouping so don't even go there,i am saying if you are going to push this living story idea over and over,DO IT RIGHT and rather than just content to do,make it fun,interesting>>>UNIQUE if your capable.
Actually, I think GW2's Open World content was by far one of the best multiplayer systems out there.
Unlike group based content, like Dungeons, and Raids, that force you be stuck with a group of people who may or may not be total assholes, or build a whole static, so you don't have to deal PUGs and thus avoid dealing with other players (Which is not really any better than soloing to be honest as far as MMO's go) GW2 really set out a true gem with their Open World Content made it so that players could and would gather together to do massive events like World Bosses simply because it was convenient, profitable, and fun to do so.
This was truly one of the best parts of the game, and such a unique hook when the game was made that it was this was a massive sale point.
Later with the addition of zones like Dry Top and the Silver Wastes they added in the idea of Meta Events which were larger, more involved events that anyone contribute to and get involved in, and this was a massive boon to their social gaming.
They later made this more complex and convoluted with HoT, and it did not go well for them, with only like 2 of the 4 zones being populated with players getting involved with the Meta, mainly Dragon Stand and Auric Basin, with VB being all but ignored for their Meta, and TD being it's own private hell.
In that regard, GW2 was one of the most Multiplayer games out there, as private groups could not hide away in their little instances, feeling all better and more superior to everyone else. Then you know, they put in a bunch of instance based content so players could hide away with their statics and feel all superior to everyone else, and it soiled their game.
Guild Wars 2's open-world multiplayer content sounded nice in theory, but it didn't work very well in practice. The problem was that it basically turned into, if you had enough players, you'd win and it was completely trivial. And if you didn't, you'd lose and it was impossible. The band in which it mattered what the players actually did was pretty small. That makes following the crowd around into the optimal strategy, which is completely stupid.
In game that is supposed to be about "Massive Gathering of Players" it was perfect, in fact, GW2's World Bosses was the modern perfected example of what EQ's World Bosses could have been. The fact that anyone could take part in DE's just made the game social, which is exactly the goal of an MMO.
It WAS a really good game.
Then they went and screwed it all up.
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
#1 fail of 99% of these mmorpg developers >>>>SINGLE player design content.I "get it"if your game doesn't have a good core of actual MMO gamer's then yeah you'll have to turn your game into a single player game and still charge them money as if it were a MMO.
Likely heard me say it before>>>login screens are nothing more than a means to operate a cash shop.This type of game should be purchased once and that is the original design of their GW1 and 2 were supposed to be.
To me it is simply a red flag the developer is not very good at developing a MMO and this without arguing over weather i think the content they do have is even RPG worthy.
If you are any good at your job,you can CREATE good enough content that people WANT to group.This was Anet marketing ploy from the very first day,trying to scoff at everything mmorpg devs are doing wrong and they would fix that.
HELLO..Anet are you home,creating single player game content is NOT how you fix the MMO side of gaming.I know MANY people will again say stuff like "i am so glad i can solo this content"again i "get it".Another thing AUTO flagging you into a group is again not fixing anything,LAZY work.
So if you want to be considered a real MMO a real rpg you have to run your design theories as such.I would NEVER listen to some person who has ZERO patience and NEEDS to run this content RIGHT now !!!Point being,of course running in a group takes time to build but there are tools to speed that up and the way i did it,simply stand at the entrance to a dungeon or nearby the content and ask to join the group.I am not saying EVERY last piece of the design has to be grouping so don't even go there,i am saying if you are going to push this living story idea over and over,DO IT RIGHT and rather than just content to do,make it fun,interesting>>>UNIQUE if your capable.
Actually, I think GW2's Open World content was by far one of the best multiplayer systems out there.
Unlike group based content, like Dungeons, and Raids, that force you be stuck with a group of people who may or may not be total assholes, or build a whole static, so you don't have to deal PUGs and thus avoid dealing with other players (Which is not really any better than soloing to be honest as far as MMO's go) GW2 really set out a true gem with their Open World Content made it so that players could and would gather together to do massive events like World Bosses simply because it was convenient, profitable, and fun to do so.
This was truly one of the best parts of the game, and such a unique hook when the game was made that it was this was a massive sale point.
Later with the addition of zones like Dry Top and the Silver Wastes they added in the idea of Meta Events which were larger, more involved events that anyone contribute to and get involved in, and this was a massive boon to their social gaming.
They later made this more complex and convoluted with HoT, and it did not go well for them, with only like 2 of the 4 zones being populated with players getting involved with the Meta, mainly Dragon Stand and Auric Basin, with VB being all but ignored for their Meta, and TD being it's own private hell.
In that regard, GW2 was one of the most Multiplayer games out there, as private groups could not hide away in their little instances, feeling all better and more superior to everyone else. Then you know, they put in a bunch of instance based content so players could hide away with their statics and feel all superior to everyone else, and it soiled their game.
Guild Wars 2's open-world multiplayer content sounded nice in theory, but it didn't work very well in practice. The problem was that it basically turned into, if you had enough players, you'd win and it was completely trivial. And if you didn't, you'd lose and it was impossible. The band in which it mattered what the players actually did was pretty small. That makes following the crowd around into the optimal strategy, which is completely stupid.
In game that is supposed to be about "Massive Gathering of Players" it was perfect, in fact, GW2's World Bosses was the modern perfected example of what EQ's World Bosses could have been. The fact that anyone could take part in DE's just made the game social, which is exactly the goal of an MMO.
It WAS a really good game.
Then they went and screwed it all up.
I still don't get your issue. By your own logic, having instances for the hardcores would only benefit you by removing the types of players you don't want to deal with. Kind of a best of both worlds situation really.
I could maybe understand if they were earning tons of loot that you can't access, but ... they're really not. The effort vs. reward of raids doesn't really add up.
In game that is supposed to be about "Massive Gathering of Players" it was perfect, in fact, GW2's World Bosses was the modern perfected example of what EQ's World Bosses could have been. The fact that anyone could take part in DE's just made the game social, which is exactly the goal of an MMO.
It WAS a really good game.
Then they went and screwed it all up.
I still don't get your issue. By your own logic, having instances for the hardcores would only benefit you by removing the types of players you don't want to deal with. Kind of a best of both worlds situation really.
I could maybe understand if they were earning tons of loot that you can't access, but ... they're really not. The effort vs. reward of raids doesn't really add up.
Ya know, If they had kept their Horizontal gear reward system in place, Raids might not have been that bad an addition. You know, just do something like they always did, add in some cool looking cosmetic stuff and called it a day.
GW2 had set a reputation for allowing anyone to get the best gear in the game,at their own pace, without needing to be part of some crusty elite class of players, with a main focus on cosmetics.
When they put in Raids, they threw themselves right into the Generic MMO's Raid culture, with linking the best gear in the game to their raids, they openly said this, that the Legendary Armor linked to raids was to be the best gear in the game to reflect the hardest challenge, and told their entire player base, Deal or GTFO.
... Yah.
Well that felt like a cold wet slap in the face.. and I was not alone in the group that Opted to GTFO.
As I was walking out the door, I saw on their forums dozens of topics expressing exactly how I felt about Raids, how doing this felt like a betrayal, there were some topics that spanned hundreds if not thousands of posts.
And, well, there was a direct outcry by the casual and moderate players, and the thing that people miss, is that casuals don't often have a lot of free time to play games, much less a lot of free time to air their grievance about a game on some forum, even less to get involved in topics that span hundreds of posts worth of time.
Any game company that would watch this kind of uproar where their casual base take the time out of their game time, to come tot heir forums and tell them en masse that they done fucked up, should have been clued in that they done fucked up.
As I saw it.. Arenanet flipped them the bird, locked and/or deleted topics, and just hoped it would pass, I guess. By the time I left and was playing BDO, nothing had changed, when I came back to give PoF a try, nothing had really changed.
I heard they added legendary armor to WvW, So my choice was Raids or Grind PvE in WvW, which was not an improvement in my outlook of game development.
But in short, Raids are what turned a once very uniquely casual friendly game, into a very obvious generic Gear Grind Raid MMO, the very thing I (and given their current situation, it is pretty obvious many others) were looking to get away from by playing GW2.
I am sure you post some truly thought provoking counters that were mentioned on their own forums many times over, like a painful dead horse and broken record, You might have what you think is a really good reason why raiders should get their better shiny, but what you don't have, is a reason why the entire other population should keep playing a game where they will always be second class citizens.
This is the plague that hits all games going down that direction, this is why WoW and many other games gave jump starts and gear boosts and all kinds of stuff to new and returning players, GW2 putting in Raids was just a sad pitiful sight see such a once great game sink down to being that generic and a game company that had managed to dodge the bullet for so many years with a cosmetic treadmill thrust upon themselves the very problem that no one else has been able to solve.
That answer your question?
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
In game that is supposed to be about "Massive Gathering of Players" it was perfect, in fact, GW2's World Bosses was the modern perfected example of what EQ's World Bosses could have been. The fact that anyone could take part in DE's just made the game social, which is exactly the goal of an MMO.
It WAS a really good game.
Then they went and screwed it all up.
I still don't get your issue. By your own logic, having instances for the hardcores would only benefit you by removing the types of players you don't want to deal with. Kind of a best of both worlds situation really.
I could maybe understand if they were earning tons of loot that you can't access, but ... they're really not. The effort vs. reward of raids doesn't really add up.
Ya know, If they had kept their Horizontal gear reward system in place, Raids might not have been that bad an addition. You know, just do something like they always did, add in some cool looking cosmetic stuff and called it a day.
GW2 had set a reputation for allowing anyone to get the best gear in the game,at their own pace, without needing to be part of some crusty elite class of players, with a main focus on cosmetics.
When they put in Raids, they threw themselves right into the Generic MMO's Raid culture, with linking the best gear in the game to their raids, they openly said this, that the Legendary Armor linked to raids was to be the best gear in the game to reflect the hardest challenge, and told their entire player base, Deal or GTFO.
... Yah.
Well that felt like a cold wet slap in the face.. and I was not alone in the group that Opted to GTFO.
As I was walking out the door, I saw on their forums dozens of topics expressing exactly how I felt about Raids, how doing this felt like a betrayal, there were some topics that spanned hundreds if not thousands of posts.
And, well, there was a direct outcry by the casual and moderate players, and the thing that people miss, is that casuals don't often have a lot of free time to play games, much less a lot of free time to air their grievance about a game on some forum, even less to get involved in topics that span hundreds of posts worth of time.
Any game company that would watch this kind of uproar where their casual base take the time out of their game time, to come tot heir forums and tell them en masse that they done fucked up, should have been clued in that they done fucked up.
As I saw it.. Arenanet flipped them the bird, locked and/or deleted topics, and just hoped it would pass, I guess. By the time I left and was playing BDO, nothing had changed, when I came back to give PoF a try, nothing had really changed.
I heard they added legendary armor to WvW, So my choice was Raids or Grind PvE in WvW, which was not an improvement in my outlook of game development.
But in short, Raids are what turned a once very uniquely casual friendly game, into a very obvious generic Gear Grind Raid MMO, the very thing I (and given their current situation, it is pretty obvious many others) were looking to get away from by playing GW2.
I am sure you post some truly thought provoking counters that were mentioned on their own forums many times over, like a painful dead horse and broken record, You might have what you think is a really good reason why raiders should get their better shiny, but what you don't have, is a reason why the entire other population should keep playing a game where they will always be second class citizens.
This is the plague that hits all games going down that direction, this is why WoW and many other games gave jump starts and gear boosts and all kinds of stuff to new and returning players, GW2 putting in Raids was just a sad pitiful sight see such a once great game sink down to being that generic and a game company that had managed to dodge the bullet for so many years with a cosmetic treadmill thrust upon themselves the very problem that no one else has been able to solve.
That answer your question?
I have my own counterarguments, and my unwillingness to provide a detailed one comes down to the pre-emptively harsh tone here more than an unwillingness to debate.
Suffice it to say that I absolutely agree that general PvE should have its own legendary armor set.
My disagreement is on the matter of gear power. Legendary armor is tied with completely obtainable ascended gear for best in stat performance, so non raiders are in no way less powerful than raiders. You can split hairs about the questionable utility of stat swapping in a game in which only a few stat combinations are viable, but that's my short say in the matter. One actually saves more money by just having a backup gear set for another stat combo than they would by building legendary gear for this feature.
In game that is supposed to be about "Massive Gathering of Players" it was perfect, in fact, GW2's World Bosses was the modern perfected example of what EQ's World Bosses could have been. The fact that anyone could take part in DE's just made the game social, which is exactly the goal of an MMO.
It WAS a really good game.
Then they went and screwed it all up.
I still don't get your issue. By your own logic, having instances for the hardcores would only benefit you by removing the types of players you don't want to deal with. Kind of a best of both worlds situation really.
I could maybe understand if they were earning tons of loot that you can't access, but ... they're really not. The effort vs. reward of raids doesn't really add up.
Ya know, If they had kept their Horizontal gear reward system in place, Raids might not have been that bad an addition. You know, just do something like they always did, add in some cool looking cosmetic stuff and called it a day.
GW2 had set a reputation for allowing anyone to get the best gear in the game,at their own pace, without needing to be part of some crusty elite class of players, with a main focus on cosmetics.
When they put in Raids, they threw themselves right into the Generic MMO's Raid culture, with linking the best gear in the game to their raids, they openly said this, that the Legendary Armor linked to raids was to be the best gear in the game to reflect the hardest challenge, and told their entire player base, Deal or GTFO.
... Yah.
Well that felt like a cold wet slap in the face.. and I was not alone in the group that Opted to GTFO.
As I was walking out the door, I saw on their forums dozens of topics expressing exactly how I felt about Raids, how doing this felt like a betrayal, there were some topics that spanned hundreds if not thousands of posts.
And, well, there was a direct outcry by the casual and moderate players, and the thing that people miss, is that casuals don't often have a lot of free time to play games, much less a lot of free time to air their grievance about a game on some forum, even less to get involved in topics that span hundreds of posts worth of time.
Any game company that would watch this kind of uproar where their casual base take the time out of their game time, to come tot heir forums and tell them en masse that they done fucked up, should have been clued in that they done fucked up.
As I saw it.. Arenanet flipped them the bird, locked and/or deleted topics, and just hoped it would pass, I guess. By the time I left and was playing BDO, nothing had changed, when I came back to give PoF a try, nothing had really changed.
I heard they added legendary armor to WvW, So my choice was Raids or Grind PvE in WvW, which was not an improvement in my outlook of game development.
But in short, Raids are what turned a once very uniquely casual friendly game, into a very obvious generic Gear Grind Raid MMO, the very thing I (and given their current situation, it is pretty obvious many others) were looking to get away from by playing GW2.
I am sure you post some truly thought provoking counters that were mentioned on their own forums many times over, like a painful dead horse and broken record, You might have what you think is a really good reason why raiders should get their better shiny, but what you don't have, is a reason why the entire other population should keep playing a game where they will always be second class citizens.
This is the plague that hits all games going down that direction, this is why WoW and many other games gave jump starts and gear boosts and all kinds of stuff to new and returning players, GW2 putting in Raids was just a sad pitiful sight see such a once great game sink down to being that generic and a game company that had managed to dodge the bullet for so many years with a cosmetic treadmill thrust upon themselves the very problem that no one else has been able to solve.
That answer your question?
I have my own counterarguments, and my unwillingness to provide a detailed one comes down to the pre-emptively harsh tone here more than an unwillingness to debate.
Suffice it to say that I absolutely agree that general PvE should have its own legendary armor set.
My disagreement is on the matter of gear power. Legendary armor is tied with completely obtainable ascended gear for best in stat performance, so non raiders are in no way less powerful than raiders. You can split hairs about the questionable utility of stat swapping in a game in which only a few stat combinations are viable, but that's my short say in the matter. One actually saves more money by just having a backup gear set for another stat combo than they would by building legendary gear for this feature.
I'll leave it at that.
Oh that "Argument"
I think that was a common dead horse on the old forums before I left.
I believe the counter to that was: No matter what you may say, Arena Net, said this was the best gear in the game. As such, if you want the best gear, you need to raid, if you don't raid, you won't have the best gear, the game suddenly ceased being about cosmetics.
Harsh reality aside of that little bit, a counter to that that I found funny, and I am paraphrasing here "Well, yer right, guess I am done, time to find another game that gives me the illusion of progress"
And I'll say this again.
Nothing personal here, but I doubt you will say anything that was not already said many times over, You have not given a reason why anyone would continue to play a game where they will forever remain a second class citizen if they don't Raid.
That is what has plagued all these other MMO's, where they put this 'Best Gear" behind their "Hardest Raid Content" and that is what do about everyone else.
No one has solved this riddle and Arena Net&GW2 is not proving to be the exception, and it was foolish and stupid of them to put themselves in that situation to start with.
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
Objective fact does tend to come across as a "dead horse argument" to someone who doesn't accept it. If something is stated plainly and frequently, it's probably because it holds some level of merit. Note that I am not calling your subjective opinion wrong. That would be unfair of me. We're in a subjective medium and, as such, personal qualms with particular mechanics (even small ones) can kill enjoyment of an entire game.
The cliche becomes the cliche because it works or at some point worked. The cliche does not become the cliche without cause.
Objective fact does tend to come across as a "dead horse argument" to someone who doesn't accept it. If something is stated plainly and frequently, it's probably because it holds some level of merit. Note that I am not calling your subjective opinion wrong. That would be unfair of me. We're in a subjective medium and, as such, personal qualms with particular mechanics (even small ones) can kill enjoyment of an entire game.
The cliche becomes the cliche because it works or at some point worked. The cliche does not become the cliche without cause.
Not at all.. in fact.. Stating the same thing that has been addressed at falty is the very definition of dead horse. This Argument has been addressed many times over.
Let me sum this up for, You "Argument" or Stand as it were, is "Just Settle for Second Rate Shit"
Maybe you do not think of it that way, but when you boil it down, and cut away the BS, that is what you are saying, and if you really thought any gamer, would in fact do that, well, you need to rethink how you think about gamers and why people play games to start with.
Just saying.
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
Now that think about it.. So does Anet if they thought doing that to their game would end well.
But you know, it's their ship, they can sink it if they wanna.
But they really should have either: Put in several ways to get Legendary armor as opposed to locking them behind Raids, or just went the cosmetic route with Raids.
They pretty much.. did the worst thing they could have possibly done.
I mean that really hurt them, and you can see how they tried to spin the ship around with PoF, but you know, maybe they were thinking "We just need to keep it going till GW3" so they didn't care about the long game.. which.. you know.. I would believe that.
Anyway.. you asked what my problem with raids was.. I explained it.
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
Comments
I'm not claiming that ArenaNet is running a scam, or something like that. Kind of the opposite, in fact. If people have actively been playing your game as much as they could for six years after launch, and all that you've added for them to buy in that time is two relatively small expansions that cost $30 each, that doesn't seem like a way for ArenaNet to make that much money. Ordinarily, you'd like for your huge fans who love your game and play it a ton to pay you more money than that.
And that's to say nothing of the people who play for a month and then quit. With the base game now free, why should they pay anything at all?
I'm somewhat skeptical of living world content, as back when I played, it was catastrophically awful, and basically accounted for a negative amount of content. It's not just that the living world junk was awful in itself. They'd drop it on top of something else to wreck some other content that you wanted to play that day, so that you'd have to either work around it or just leave and come back in two weeks. The wiki descriptions make it sound like the newer Living World content is a totally different mechanic that just happens to share a name with the early ("season 1") version for some inexplicable reason.
Season 1 was all about changing existing content. Little of it was permanent. It was mostly comprised of open world events that might sometimes change or shape a map (with the biggest example being the destroyed Tower of Nightmares in Kessex Hills).
Seasons 3 and 4 are all about addition. Every episode comes with a new map of considerable size, alongside multiple story instances that push a personal story narrative AND a potential fractal and/or raid wing addition. The primary difference between the living story instances and the personal story ones is that the choices of the personal story are replaced by a single higher-quality narrative. The presentation has also improved considerably, with the awkward conversation backdrops being replaced by real time ingame dialogue that works much better.
Basically, ever since Season 3 started, Guild Wars 2 has been getting content at a much faster rate than at any other point in its post-launch lifespan. It hasn't been on maintenance mode. What remains to be seen is whether they can keep the pace now.
"What dreadful business!"................indeed
Expansions are what brought this game back from the brink of dying.
The problem with just pumping out content is that it has the effect of spreading out the existing player base, which is not what you want to happen in a game as it gets older, you want the Starting Zones to remain populated, you want the new players to see that the old players are still around, that this place is active.
So content addition is a risky game of giving players enough so that the world feels vast, but not too much so that the world feels dead.
If they just kept pumping out maps, and spreading the players out more and more, all they would accomplish is making the game overall feel more and more dead, even if the population had remained constant or even grown.
Also, to be honest, the Core GW2, game was one of the best games I ever played, it was really set up top notch as an MMO, so, it's hard to improve upon something that starts that strong, their miserable screw up called HoT showed that clearly.
But to each their own. I am not saying that what they are doing now is a good thing, or that they are not a sinking ship at this point.
I am just saying.. they have been working on the game and putting stuff out.
Previous to HoT, they had been hovering between 18 - 20 million a quarter, Hardly anywhere near the brink of dying, in fact they were doing quite well.
After HoT, their sales dropped to average 12 million a quarter, causing them a loss of roughly 6 million a quarter, for estimated loss of 30 million over the course of time between HoT and PoF.
PoF offred very little in the way of a spike at all, with only 18 million (Less than the average Pre-HoT quarterly sales) , with almost a negabel amount of pre-orders, which means that PoF proved very clearly that HoT cost them a huge amount of good will among their player base.
In short, HoT alone set them back around 15 million and permanently damaged their reputation among their player base.
That is why people say HoT sucked... because it did.
If you're going to do something new, you don't want to tag it with a name that has strongly negative connotations because of what the name has been applied to before. Living World probably means something very different to people who have been actively playing season 4 than to those who have only ever seen season 1. If your goal is to get the latter to come back and give your name another look, it's about as big of a marketing blunder as having a typical bag mechanic and calling it "loot boxes" in a game that doesn't have anything analogous to what other games mean by loot boxes. It's a fairly descriptive name in isolation, but has connotations that you really want to avoid.
Likely heard me say it before>>>login screens are nothing more than a means to operate a cash shop.This type of game should be purchased once and that is the original design of their GW1 and 2 were supposed to be.
To me it is simply a red flag the developer is not very good at developing a MMO and this without arguing over weather i think the content they do have is even RPG worthy.
If you are any good at your job,you can CREATE good enough content that people WANT to group.This was Anet marketing ploy from the very first day,trying to scoff at everything mmorpg devs are doing wrong and they would fix that.
HELLO..Anet are you home,creating single player game content is NOT how you fix the MMO side of gaming.I know MANY people will again say stuff like "i am so glad i can solo this content"again i "get it".Another thing AUTO flagging you into a group is again not fixing anything,LAZY work.
So if you want to be considered a real MMO a real rpg you have to run your design theories as such.I would NEVER listen to some person who has ZERO patience and NEEDS to run this content RIGHT now !!!Point being,of course running in a group takes time to build but there are tools to speed that up and the way i did it,simply stand at the entrance to a dungeon or nearby the content and ask to join the group.I am not saying EVERY last piece of the design has to be grouping so don't even go there,i am saying if you are going to push this living story idea over and over,DO IT RIGHT and rather than just content to do,make it fun,interesting>>>UNIQUE if your capable.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Unlike group based content, like Dungeons, and Raids, that force you be stuck with a group of people who may or may not be total assholes, or build a whole static, so you don't have to deal PUGs and thus avoid dealing with other players (Which is not really any better than soloing to be honest as far as MMO's go) GW2 really set out a true gem with their Open World Content made it so that players could and would gather together to do massive events like World Bosses simply because it was convenient, profitable, and fun to do so.
This was truly one of the best parts of the game, and such a unique hook when the game was made that it was this was a massive sale point.
Later with the addition of zones like Dry Top and the Silver Wastes they added in the idea of Meta Events which were larger, more involved events that anyone contribute to and get involved in, and this was a massive boon to their social gaming.
They later made this more complex and convoluted with HoT, and it did not go well for them, with only like 2 of the 4 zones being populated with players getting involved with the Meta, mainly Dragon Stand and Auric Basin, with VB being all but ignored for their Meta, and TD being it's own private hell.
In that regard, GW2 was one of the most Multiplayer games out there, as private groups could not hide away in their little instances, feeling all better and more superior to everyone else. Then you know, they put in a bunch of instance based content so players could hide away with their statics and feel all superior to everyone else, and it soiled their game.
It WAS a really good game.
Then they went and screwed it all up.
I could maybe understand if they were earning tons of loot that you can't access, but ... they're really not. The effort vs. reward of raids doesn't really add up.
GW2 had set a reputation for allowing anyone to get the best gear in the game,at their own pace, without needing to be part of some crusty elite class of players, with a main focus on cosmetics.
When they put in Raids, they threw themselves right into the Generic MMO's Raid culture, with linking the best gear in the game to their raids, they openly said this, that the Legendary Armor linked to raids was to be the best gear in the game to reflect the hardest challenge, and told their entire player base, Deal or GTFO.
... Yah.
Well that felt like a cold wet slap in the face.. and I was not alone in the group that Opted to GTFO.
As I was walking out the door, I saw on their forums dozens of topics expressing exactly how I felt about Raids, how doing this felt like a betrayal, there were some topics that spanned hundreds if not thousands of posts.
And, well, there was a direct outcry by the casual and moderate players, and the thing that people miss, is that casuals don't often have a lot of free time to play games, much less a lot of free time to air their grievance about a game on some forum, even less to get involved in topics that span hundreds of posts worth of time.
Any game company that would watch this kind of uproar where their casual base take the time out of their game time, to come tot heir forums and tell them en masse that they done fucked up, should have been clued in that they done fucked up.
As I saw it.. Arenanet flipped them the bird, locked and/or deleted topics, and just hoped it would pass, I guess. By the time I left and was playing BDO, nothing had changed, when I came back to give PoF a try, nothing had really changed.
I heard they added legendary armor to WvW, So my choice was Raids or Grind PvE in WvW, which was not an improvement in my outlook of game development.
But in short, Raids are what turned a once very uniquely casual friendly game, into a very obvious generic Gear Grind Raid MMO, the very thing I (and given their current situation, it is pretty obvious many others) were looking to get away from by playing GW2.
I am sure you post some truly thought provoking counters that were mentioned on their own forums many times over, like a painful dead horse and broken record, You might have what you think is a really good reason why raiders should get their better shiny, but what you don't have, is a reason why the entire other population should keep playing a game where they will always be second class citizens.
This is the plague that hits all games going down that direction, this is why WoW and many other games gave jump starts and gear boosts and all kinds of stuff to new and returning players, GW2 putting in Raids was just a sad pitiful sight see such a once great game sink down to being that generic and a game company that had managed to dodge the bullet for so many years with a cosmetic treadmill thrust upon themselves the very problem that no one else has been able to solve.
That answer your question?
Suffice it to say that I absolutely agree that general PvE should have its own legendary armor set.
My disagreement is on the matter of gear power. Legendary armor is tied with completely obtainable ascended gear for best in stat performance, so non raiders are in no way less powerful than raiders. You can split hairs about the questionable utility of stat swapping in a game in which only a few stat combinations are viable, but that's my short say in the matter. One actually saves more money by just having a backup gear set for another stat combo than they would by building legendary gear for this feature.
I'll leave it at that.
I think that was a common dead horse on the old forums before I left.
I believe the counter to that was: No matter what you may say, Arena Net, said this was the best gear in the game. As such, if you want the best gear, you need to raid, if you don't raid, you won't have the best gear, the game suddenly ceased being about cosmetics.
Harsh reality aside of that little bit, a counter to that that I found funny, and I am paraphrasing here "Well, yer right, guess I am done, time to find another game that gives me the illusion of progress"
And I'll say this again.
Nothing personal here, but I doubt you will say anything that was not already said many times over, You have not given a reason why anyone would continue to play a game where they will forever remain a second class citizen if they don't Raid.
That is what has plagued all these other MMO's, where they put this 'Best Gear" behind their "Hardest Raid Content" and that is what do about everyone else.
No one has solved this riddle and Arena Net&GW2 is not proving to be the exception, and it was foolish and stupid of them to put themselves in that situation to start with.
The cliche becomes the cliche because it works or at some point worked. The cliche does not become the cliche without cause.
Let me sum this up for, You "Argument" or Stand as it were, is "Just Settle for Second Rate Shit"
Maybe you do not think of it that way, but when you boil it down, and cut away the BS, that is what you are saying, and if you really thought any gamer, would in fact do that, well, you need to rethink how you think about gamers and why people play games to start with.
Just saying.
But you know, it's their ship, they can sink it if they wanna.
But they really should have either: Put in several ways to get Legendary armor as opposed to locking them behind Raids, or just went the cosmetic route with Raids.
They pretty much.. did the worst thing they could have possibly done.
I mean that really hurt them, and you can see how they tried to spin the ship around with PoF, but you know, maybe they were thinking "We just need to keep it going till GW3" so they didn't care about the long game.. which.. you know.. I would believe that.
Anyway.. you asked what my problem with raids was.. I explained it.