The game does have 'equality of chance,' which means that every person has a chance to get the same things, and through many different methods. This evens out the playing field.
And this thread continues to be proof positive that Guild Wars 2 is working.
I do see 1 flaw and the majority of ppl who think it isnt true should reconsider pleaying GAMES in general.
When u said that being better then the other(for whtever reason- gear/skill/investment) is what ppl are used to then ur forgeting what GAMING is made for...
I dont play games to socialize with ppl who are sitting god knows where behind another pc, i dont play to just play, i play it for competition... THATS WHAT A GAME IS get used to it just sayin...
Tell me 1 game, ANY game where there isnt a winner and a loser. If u do that i will agree witht his post and support it. but u cant. so GG but gaming is for 1 player to show he is better then the other in whatever way it is.
Any RPG.
RPG's are not meant to so Black-White. RPG's are supposed to be ever changing, dynamic and focused on telling an engaging story and letting you live it out through a character in the world. I think you must be looking for FPS'ers or RTS's. Those games are about pwning noobs, but RPG's are always and will forever be about story first.
I am pretty damn sure I didnt spend my weekends 24+ years ago trying to beat people up, instead I was apart of something bigger then myself. Something that a Dungeon Master spent alot of time crafting and building up while I had fun living in his little world. Things like levels and skill aquisition were the main forms of accessing character progression and was never about aquiring that +9 Vorpal Sword of Dragon Slaying. RPG's in general and MMO's in particular are spiritual successors in good old fashion fantasy worlds that you want to live in......in other words its about having fun first and foremost.
Playing: GW2 Waiting on: TESO Next Flop: Planetside 2 Best MMO of all time: Asheron's Call - The first company to recreate AC will be the next greatest MMO.
This have nothing to do with casuals Vs no-lifers at all.
It is really about skill Vs time investment. Most mmos do reward people for grinding stuff instead of being good.
And some people are indeed at the top because they are good but surprisngly many just grind on to get a gear advantage.
MMOs should reward players for playing good, not for spending forever in a Wow battleground while sucking badly to gain points slowly.
I been playing mmos since M59 first released in '96 and the games have become more and more focused on gear while also becomming easier. Any moron can get a really powerful PvP armor by just keep playing for a long time and therefor get an advantage.
In GW2 you wont get that advantage just as you don't get it in gW and that will tick some people off badly, and not because it is "casual" but because the only thing that matters is how good player you are. Of course you will become better with practice but your achivements willbe yours, not your gears.
I agree that there will be plenty of crying though, but that will include some people that consider themselves "L33T" in other games.
This have nothing to do with casuals Vs no-lifers at all.
It is really about skill Vs time investment. Most mmos do reward people for grinding stuff instead of being good.
And some people are indeed at the top because they are good but surprisngly many just grind on to get a gear advantage.
MMOs should reward players for playing good, not for spending forever in a Wow battleground while sucking badly to gain points slowly.
I been playing mmos since M59 first released in '96 and the games have become more and more focused on gear while also becomming easier. Any moron can get a really powerful PvP armor by just keep playing for a long time and therefor get an advantage.
In GW2 you wont get that advantage just as you don't get it in gW and that will tick some people off badly, and not because it is "casual" but because the only thing that matters is how good player you are. Of course you will become better with practice but your achivements willbe yours, not your gears.
I agree that there will be plenty of crying though, but that will include some people that consider themselves "L33T" in other games.
I am no MMO newbie my friend. My roots go back to Darksun Online. We are basically the same (first) generation of MMO gamers. I have been around th block and played them all and I can see whats actually happening here and thats gamer group A have created a "boogieman" for why they are not as good as or accomplished as gamer group B.
That boogieman is the "elitists" or the raiders. They have convinced themselves these people are not actually better at the game but just have more time and that time enables them to get way better gear in which to beat up on them and steal their lunch money. The thing is that in some cases this may indeed be true. Some raiders are indeed not very good. They are known as "carries". But they are NEVER the majority in any decent raid force that actually accomplsihes anything. To pretend the majority of raiders are unskilled clowns able to just faceroll content because they have better gear is ridiculous. They are simply skilled gamers who know how to play the game. They also learn the ins and outs of their classes and how to play them effectively. The Raiding community is almost always the theorycrafters. The ones who "grind" the numbers and formultate the strategies (time investment is not just camping a mob btw). The ones who recruit other like-minded and equally skilled gamers and push content.
And heres where GW2 comes into play. Just because you subtract the gear from the equation will not remove the rest of what makes the raider playerbase good at gaming. Hell gear actually wont be subtracted from the equation, in fact it may play a bigger role than ever because the more knowledgeable theorycrafting raider will put together gear sets which are more efficient for their build. Will all raiders do this? No. But they will in much higher percentages than Joe Casual just like in every other game.
So what you will see happen here will be no different than other MMO's. Those who put in the time and effort and surround themselves with better players will be the ones beat crushing everyone. And I can guarantee you its not gonna be the scrubs who play 30 minutes a day and buy lots of gems in the cash shop to keep pace. It'll be the same crowd. The "raider" type, the casual boogieman. And what will Joe Casual do? He will cry and call for nerfs and say the boogieman has some unfair advantage because ______ <----Insert excuse there.
I think the main issue with people complaining about how MMORPG's should work is, they are focusing solely on the level / gear / crafting mechanics of the game.
One of the first Online Roleplaying Games I ever played was furcadia. It was nothing but a graphical MUD (multi user domain). It was still an RPG, because people really did roleplay in it.
This entire thread is talking about the level/gear mechanics of the game. That is where this competitive crap comes in. Everyone is completely missing the core elements of what make an RPG an RPG... character identity, community, personal growth.
I am one of those players who still has enough free time to be "uber" and get all the time-sink rewards. But I don't do it to compete with people. I do it because character growth is fun to me. That is why you are seeing so many first person shooters adopting this leveling / achievement system. Its because accomplishments are alot of fun in games. That is why it boggles my mind that some people pay others to level their character up to the cap in some MMORPGs. I have never played another persons account or ever purchased an account for a game, because playing the game doesn't feel right unless the character is mine and mine only, and I've been at the helm of the character for its entirety.
I once had a conversation with my friends about 6-7 years ago, back when we would lift weights. I said, "What is the only thing in the world most like an RPG character?"
- Time requirements
- Effort
// in exchange for //
- Visible signs of growth
- Increases in demonstratable power from growth
- Non-tangible, personal
The only thing I could think of in life that mirrored these aspects of RPG leveling up / character growth was weight lifting. There is nothing in life that I can think of, that has time and effort requirements, that give the person more power or skill, is visible to others without speaking/acting, and cannot be bought or traded. (This is assuming that your character in an RPG is not bought or traded.)
I guess I'm kind of straying off topic here. But my point is, MMORPG's must always have room for character growth. Thats whats truly important. Wether it be achievements or purple gear, or skill ups, there always needs to be room to grow. Now the carrot on the stick thing occured when Blizzard and other companies starting putting out expansions with green gear better then slightly lower level purples. Growth in MMORPG's is usually permanent, but the way end game raiding has been functioning lately, nothing you do or get will be worth while forever. It will only be good until the next expansion arrives.
A friend of mine still plays EQ1. And from what I heard, there is no "expansion trumping previous raids" type stuff. In order to do raid #32, you have to get the gear from raid #31, and before that, raid #30... etc etc. Correct me if I am wrong about this. But thats what EQ1 is supposedly still doing.
I guess a good way to look at how MMORPG's should be played is thinking of golf versus tennis. Tennis you can't play alone. Your skill is only measured by how you do compared to others. This is how many MMORPG's are being made now. They are becoming like Tennis matches. When really they should be played like Golf. Golf is not only a game with competition but a game where your personal best is important. You can play alone and still have alot of fun.
Anyways...umm.. I don't really have a conclusion so I'll just end here. But good post OP.
I am no MMO newbie my friend. My roots go back to Darksun Online. We are basically the same (first) generation of MMO gamers. I have been around th block and played them all and I can see whats actually happening here and thats gamer group A have created a "boogieman" for why they are not as good as or accomplished as gamer group B.
That boogieman is the "elitists" or the raiders. They have convinced themselves these people are not actually better at the game but just have more time and that time enables them to get way better gear in which to beat up on them and steal their lunch money. The thing is that in some cases this may indeed be true. Some raiders are indeed not very good. They are known as "carries". But they are NEVER the majority in any decent raid force that actually accomplsihes anything. To pretend the majority of raiders are unskilled clowns able to just faceroll content because they have better gear is ridiculous. They are simply skilled gamers who know how to play the game. They also learn the ins and outs of their classes and how to play them effectively. The Raiding community is almost always the theorycrafters. The ones who "grind" the numbers and formultate the strategies (time investment is not just camping a mob btw). The ones who recruit other like-minded and equally skilled gamers and push content.
And heres where GW2 comes into play. Just because you subtract the gear from the equation will not remove the rest of what makes the raider playerbase good at gaming. Hell gear actually wont be subtracted from the equation, in fact it may play a bigger role than ever because the more knowledgeable theorycrafting raider will put together gear sets which are more efficient for their build. Will all raiders do this? No. But they will in much higher percentages than Joe Casual just like in every other game.
So what you will see happen here will be no different than other MMO's. Those who put in the time and effort and surround themselves with better players will be the ones beat crushing everyone. And I can guarantee you its not gonna be the scrubs who play 30 minutes a day and buy lots of gems in the cash shop to keep pace. It'll be the same crowd. The "raider" type.
To some part, that is true. Many raiders are good players but i also know several raiders iRL that actually aren't that good. A certain someone whines on his guild (mostly his IRL friends) so he can join their raids, others have good social skills and use that.
In the earliest MMOs gear did matter, and time investentment but skills also mattered more than it does now. When someone that completly suck can beat someone that is really good only because of gear something is wrong.
I played a lot of GW and there good players always win, so I for one like this.
Then of course there probably is plenty of players who blame the ger for their own bad playing (I know more than a few of those as well) and they will probably be even agrier here.
But I first come from P&P RPGs and have played MMOs since the first gen and I have been worrying about the rising focus on gear since EQ. I think it is great that a AAA MMO finally releases without gear focus.
And yeah, I been doing my part of raiding but I got tired of the old hamsterwheel. The last year i only been playing GW and some old NWN in lan for multiplayer RPGing. Funny enough is it because I suddenly got more spare time so i can play P&P RPGs instead, but the choice of GW is because everything I succed with there is because me and my group did a good job, not what gear we have gotten.
There were plenty of grinding in old MMOs as well, but there it was to level up and for some reason tha felt a lot more fun than to get the next tier of gear.
I hope GW2 inspires devs to lessen the gear focus in MMOs.
After reading the OP's post in full I realized lots of it was off but its os much might aswell not go into detail on every little point. What has to be realized is that all the major release mmos since wow have been designed around casual including wow itself while trying to preserve elements for harc core players. Problem is raidng should not be the rule but the alternative much of the time since it tends to be a major time sink. Now to be fair some games have very short end games raids that require skill more than anything (dcuo comes to mind raids can take from 15 mins to 1 hour with the best teams). I think GW2 is already on track to dodge that problem but there will still be players who simply play better and more than ever will this become apparent . I mean you can give anybody some paper and pencil but what they do with it is up to them.
I'm sorry OP, but this game changes nothing in terms of what you're describing.
Starting with the cash model, this game is a F2P model (with a hefty entry price surprisingly) with a cash shop (which remains to be seen how P2win it will be). They follow the exact same model every other NCsoft game is currently following (all NCsoft games right now are F2P cash shop, just without the initial price, so they are even better monetised). So, not much of a change there, F2P games have been around for a while, quality F2P games start to emerge recently however.
As for the rest, time is the one resource noone has enough of. You and I don't know if we'll be alive tomorrow. Sure, we can amass a fortune and the older you get the (possibly) more you have, but the less actual time you have. So spending time in an MMO (or any other hobby activity) is actually quality time taken out of our short lives that is more important than money. And hobbies are supposed to be fun, so spending time on them should also be pleasant. Of course, depending on hobbies, they can be costy as well. But what defines their quality is not the amount of cash you spend on them, but the amount of fun you get out of them when you spend time on them.
Maybe it's me getting older and closer to the closure of my existence that makes me see the quality time I have as the most important aspect than any epeen and false pride that can be bought with cash.
There were plenty of grinding in old MMOs as well, but there it was to level up and for some reason tha felt a lot more fun than to get the next tier of gear.
I hope GW2 inspires devs to lessen the gear focus in MMOs.
I crave character progression more than anything and agree that progression nowadays is far to gear-centric. But the thing I prefer is stuff like EQ1 style AA systems which allow basically unlimited advancement. I knew I would never max out because I didnt have the time but you know what? I didnt care because I always had something I could do to progress my character. Shit, the same could be said of gear back then. Gear was harder to come by and chances are you would never get all the best pieces for your character. And you know? it was great because it gave me something to look forward to. The adventure didnt end. Progression didnt end. But we cant have those games anymore because the casuals cry "grind!" and "unfair" and "boring".
So Nowadays most games your character hits max level and cant progress further in that way. Gear is the only route and the items are relatively easy to acquire and you can deck out your guy in all the best stuff. In other words. The adventure ends.
Guess which game GW2 is?
But I know this and I will be playing GW2 as more of a MOBA/FPS like pvp game. That doesnt bug me. What does irk me is all the casual people here who think that because GW2 isnt like the first game I mentioned that they will somehow be as good as everyone else when the hard reality is that if they sucked and didnt have much time to play other MMO's then they will suck at GW2 as well. BUT...but this time they wont have their boogieman to blame. The bullshit QQ from their peanut gallery will be hilarious this time. And it will be baseless, unfounded garbage.
Well, more and more games are implementing some sort of horizontal advancement model without disgarding the gear upgrades. The most recent example is Rift I believe.Also TSW seem to be focusing on horizontal advancement as well, besides the obvious gear upgrades.
In any case, if AoC lack of meaninful gear upgrades at the launch of the game was any indication, people don't like gears to lose their value. That's the main reason the whole gear system was revamped in AoC and I'm sure it's been an educational experience for TSW as well, levels or lack of.
However, I must say that it has nothing to do with being a "old mmo player" even I know that many love their habits to death and even still longing of some short of grinding in games for the said "shiny armor" you very well described.
It has to do with personal point of view and what one wants as also how much a person can adapt to changes.
I have alpha/beta tested and played around 300 mmos so far and being it sports, beat em up, rpg, strategy, puzzle or racing based or a mix of these, most of them had indeed most things in common and that was for the most part everything you stated.
Some that tried to stand out couldn't find enough interest and got shoved or cancelled because the old good "I can be better than you" aspects were missing (also because they weren't published well either to be honest).
2 of my old time favorite mmos ever, came out in 2004-2005 (city of heroes/villains and guild wars).
Both mmos were community friendly, were innovative and stylish (Sidekick system, the best character creation tools and no armor in CoH, personal involvment of your character in the story, strategical skill system among other things in gw).
Even the "Trinity" system were in place, it wasn't totally nessecary to progress in the game (except of a few spots in GW to be honest or partially in pvp).
The difference they both brought in the mmo world got loved by everyone that appreciated the innovation and hated by the ones that missed the "superiority".
I can't wait for GW2 and Archage to come out because both games will change quite a few things in the mmo world like CoH and Guild Wars did in the past.
Things that in my opinion will make developers (or at least I hope so) to start being more innovative and less afraid to bring up something new on the table instead of creating the next mmo clone with the same old features for the grinding neighbor to put his hands on 24/7.
In the old days you had F2P titles with P2W cash shops, then in a glorious stroke of innovation Anet sold us B2P titles with P2W cash shops and a subset of the MMO population cried out in thanks.
[mod edit]
ANet with GW1 didn't even had the cash shop when it was launched... It was implemented after and offers character outfits, extra char slots, name change, gender change, bonus mission pack for EOTN, pvp items and spells for pvp char only, and that's about it I think...
So where's the P2W in that GW cash shop?
If what you just said is correct then the PvP spells and items you said were in GW1 would be the standard definition of pay to win
This items and spells were usable only for PVP characters which had no access to PVE content or whatver content outside the PVP island. This was created so people can actually jump right into PVP without the need to ever go trough PVE and unlock spells trough PVE only to use them on PVP characters. That's the intention of that skill pack and items pack, not to force people to do PVE if they do not want to since those spells and items are only usable by PVP only characters and let them jump right into the pvping.
I don't agree it's a P2W, since if you don't play pve you can buy it as well, or if you play pve you'll get those items and spells anyway so you don't need to buy it since you already have everything.
"Happiness is not a destination. It is a method of life." -------------------------------
While I agree with the prevailing points of the post, I don't know that GW2 has proven it will make all of the changes suggested here. A lot of what we have been told makes it sound that way, but until the mass market has evaluated the implementation of these features, I remain slightly skeptical (yet extremely excited about launch and playing it for myself).
Man you were asking for it! I havent read all the posted responses but I wouldn't be surprised if one of those die hard "I played WoW from beta" players didn't flame lol.
This have nothing to do with casuals Vs no-lifers at all.
It is really about skill Vs time investment. Most mmos do reward people for grinding stuff instead of being good.
And some people are indeed at the top because they are good but surprisngly many just grind on to get a gear advantage.
MMOs should reward players for playing good, not for spending forever in a Wow battleground while sucking badly to gain points slowly.
I been playing mmos since M59 first released in '96 and the games have become more and more focused on gear while also becomming easier. Any moron can get a really powerful PvP armor by just keep playing for a long time and therefor get an advantage.
In GW2 you wont get that advantage just as you don't get it in gW and that will tick some people off badly, and not because it is "casual" but because the only thing that matters is how good player you are. Of course you will become better with practice but your achivements willbe yours, not your gears.
I agree that there will be plenty of crying though, but that will include some people that consider themselves "L33T" in other games.
The amount of whining from PvP'ers that consider themselves "leet" in other games is going to be something to behold. And I agree with you, we're going to see/hear plenty of it. Some people really hate games that don't have "superarmor," or a way to gain a sharp advantage over others. I think most of the people freaking out never played GW1 and don't fully realize that the days of skating by on epic gear are about to be over if they intend to play. You're really going to have to be GOOD now, not just have the most damage mitigation and crit rating on your gear.
Every GW2 thread that's started any more seems to devolve into pissing and moaning. It's really grating on my last nerve. I intend to enjoy the game regardless of the naysayers. Hell, I'm still playing SWTOR and enjoying it and I'm fairly certain that GW2 will be a better game.
One of my prime hopes for Guild Wars 2 was that it would have people re-evaluate things, possibly on a large scale, that it would have people looking at stuff that occurs that we take for granted as part of the system. That it would shake things up and prove that things set in stone don't need to be set in stone.
I know what you mean. Stone-tablets are really unwieldy, and very expensive to have shipped from Amazon. I prefer an iPad, myself.
I'm familiar with the concept of a paradigm shift from a scientific viewpoint. Eventually something comes along, a new theorem that no one cares to accept, and then the evidence starts piling up in support of it and slowly you get more and more supporters. It really pisses people off, and everyone hates the change, but at the end of the day everyone still has a better understanding of the inner-workings of the Universe than they did prior.
Science? Cool! Maybe "Myth-busters" could do a show on MMORPGs?
And I really think that we need to do some deconstructionalist analysm of MMORPGs in general,
That may be outside of the scope of "Myth-busters". A shame really.
there are many things that we accept as set in stone that clearly... well, aren't. The accepted paradigm of the MMORPG has a linear flow to it, and one that many developers have been afraid to break. It's something that's been so ingrained via both classic conditioning (pavlovian responses) and oeprant (consequential) conditioning that people believe it has to go that way.
Come to think of it: I have been drooling over the GW2 beta-footage lately. Maybe you are right.
What those who play a singleplayer or co-op game expect is vastly different to what those who play an MMORPG accept. And I think that the MMORPG has fallen into an unhealthy, stagnant rut. So what do we accept?
• You pay a subscription.
Isn' it funny that "subscribe" is spelled with a "b", whereas "subscription" is spelled with a "p"?
• You can't buy anything of worth in the game with real money.
Well, that may be because it is almost impossible to find a gift shop which accepts Master Card in Doomlore Shrine.
• These time investements are massive and favour those without real life responsibilities or connections.
I know. Completely unrealistic.
• In order to substantiate these time investments, a 'carrot' is needed.
They say carrots are good for you eyes.
This is a fascinating concept. Not only because I can't really understand the appeal, but because of the divide it creates. First of all, I want to cover not understanding the appeal. The lack of appeal in my case is that I can't understand why you'd want to waste your life for a constant chain of 'carrots.'
Right on! To top it off they probably go on some gaming-forum and rant at everyone else about how stupid they are!
"So why are you raiding?"
"To get better gear."
"Which gives you?"
"Bigger numbers."
"Why do you need those?"
"The boss has bigger numbers."
"What do you get from the boss?"
"Better gear!"
"And what do you do with that?"
"Kill the next boss, duh!"
At least they speak in concise language.
The problem is is that not everyone is able to make these ridiculous time investments. You have people with children, a family, a job, social obligations, and so on. The sort of people who're considered 'casuals.' Now, the usual MMORPG talks about these people in derogatory ways, often considering them not 'leet' or not 'hardcore' enough. Because having a job and a child isn't 'hardcore.' So they sneer at such people and demand that the game be made more for them, creating more time investments.
True. The number of times I have had people sneer at me for not being a hardcore writer of long posts on gaming forums. Some of us have pet hamsters to look after!
But where did this begin?
I think you will have to take that up with your parents.
It all started off with subscriptions. In order to justify a subscription, you have to pad out content. This means that instead of a ten minute mission in Mass Effect 3, you're doing a five hour questing slog. Really, it shouldn't be that long, but it is. So you get to the quest vendor and they offer you these 'carrots,' these rewards. The idea here is that more weak-willed people get hooked on the idea of somehow, somehow being better than other people. In some small way... better.
In my experience the story about the bees and flowers works better. The fairytales collected by the Brothers Grimm are supposed to work as sex education by allegory, but this is too opaque for me.
in order to sneer down at those who don't have the same level of access to the game that they do. That's what it's all about. That shiny mount, that exclusive raid, that high-end armour? It's all to be better than someone else. One-upmanship, plain and simple. It's not a difficult concept.
Well, not for someone who uses words like "deconstructionalist" and "oeprant" as freely as you do.
At the power plateau, it won't matter if you've put eight hours into the game or eight thousand, you're all equal.
Well at the very least the latter is likely to have a better chance of developing arthritis than the former.
This is a terrifying concept to those who've ruled with time investments.
Never go for time-shares! They are not the investments they are touted as.
There are casual players out there just waiting for the MMORPGs that are designed for them to play. And those are on the way. One of the first is Guild Wars 2.
So there will be a sequel?
And like I said, it's working.
It is. I feel more equal already.
What Guild Wars 2 is doing is shaking things up, it's altering perceptions. It's saying that what was set in stone was an illusion, and that things can be completely different. Those who helped set those rules in stone are going to rail against that. Of course they are. No more exclusive content for them. Yes, that's going to suck for them. Because the reason they play an MMORPG, even in PvE, is just to be better than someone.
Interesting. I think the revivalists had the same thought. Are you related by any chance?
I mean, look at WoW.
Uhm. Maybe not. I am not supposed to look at WoW at work. It might also offend my female colleagues.
WoW, from the ground up, conditions you to want to be better than someone.
Absolutely. Nothing signals "I am better than you" like a "worn leather belt".
It puts in various ways to force you to compete. You can easily accidentally flag yourself as PvP, resource nodes are instancedglobally rather than per player, which makes people fight over them, and the whole thing is one massive sociopathic circlejerk.
I don't recall seeing any jerking (circle or otherwise) in WoW. Isn't it more of a Second Life-thing?
It's just people being horribly indecent to each other. But again, the old MMORPG player, the time investor, they're comfortable with that.
Personally I was never very comfortable with indecent exposure in WoW. Fortunately the gear-fixation with armour ensures that people remain decently covered most of the time. That is one advantage, you will have to grant me that!
In Guild Wars 2 they'll actually have to socialise with people, they'll have to be nice, they won't be in complete control, they'll be equal. This turns everything they know on its head. And that's why we've had so many threads about this. It's old MMORPG players damn near having a brain aneurysm at all of the rules they thought they knew being turned upon their heads.
Are you sure it isn't just all that circle-jerking causing hyper-tension?
No longer lords and ladies. Just peons. Like the rest of us.
You are saying GW2 will be like Warcraft 3, then?
They have to come back down to the real world.
Would that be the world of Tyria?
But what we're getting instead now is that they're seeing the other side of the equation. Just because there's equality, they're blowing it out of proportion and saying that money ivnestors will be on top. That's obviously not the case, but that's the fear that they have, because they're having these crazy slippery slope theories.
I know what you mean. I guess it's just math-anxiety, though. Still, not being able to distinguish a homogenous from a non-homogenous linear equations... That's just dumb.
The results are frankly hilarious.
I wholeheartedly agree.
If I were a vindictive person, I'd pester ArenaNet to actually include an $80 monocle in the game, just so that I could buy it, wear it, and flaunt it at the time investors. But I'm not a vindictive person. Like I've said before, my approach to the game will be to find the most sensible, utilitarian armour I can and stick with that. I don't really give a shit about being the prettiest pony on the block.
Good thing you are such a unassuming person!
If you are going to play Charr, you most assuredly will not be prettiest anything on the block (no offence). I also didn't like Worgen with top-hats, so I may be biased. In any case, flaunting a cosmetic item you paid $80 for would ruin any act of vindictiveness, I am afraid.
But if you understand the paradigm shift, here, if you understand how the patterns are changing, then you understand why every one of these new threads exists. It's forcing people to question all that was supposedly set in stone about GW2. And like I said, that says to me... GW2 works. I am pleased.
Yes! We are of the same mind, I think. The first Matrix was by far the best movie!
You're equating an RL activity (saving for a soccer ball) to a game. A game is not RL. A game is not work. This is where the argument falls apart for me. In my opinion, if you want to work then why not get a job? A game is something you play to enjoy some leisure time. And the progression comes from the story and your personal enjoyment of the game.
For some people, possibly you included, the hassle of "working" in a game is not fun, but for many others, like me, if we get everything free and easy it becomes meaningless. My enjoyment of a game comes from accomplishing things, hard things, and feeling how my character is progressing. If I accomplish something that was never hard or didn't require "work", like buying a vanity item from the store for 5 bucks, I really don't feel attached to it. I don't find value in it.
You could definitly do that, one way is find the lowest level mob, probably near town, and grind on them until you hit max level. I am sure that would very hard to do, if you make it, that would be something to feel proud of.
There's a difference between a challenge and doing something stupid.
Becoming the No. 1 tennis player in the world = challenge
Trying to become the No. 1 tennis player in the world by playing without a racket and shoes = stupid
Does buying the best racket and shoes mean you will win the French Open?
It very well could be if the difference is big enough and the skill between the players is close. If you put Federer play against Nada, the latter using a wooden racket and sandals, the first using whatever top gear they use right now, who do you think will win?
You're equating an RL activity (saving for a soccer ball) to a game. A game is not RL. A game is not work. This is where the argument falls apart for me. In my opinion, if you want to work then why not get a job? A game is something you play to enjoy some leisure time. And the progression comes from the story and your personal enjoyment of the game.
For some people, possibly you included, the hassle of "working" in a game is not fun, but for many others, like me, if we get everything free and easy it becomes meaningless. My enjoyment of a game comes from accomplishing things, hard things, and feeling how my character is progressing. If I accomplish something that was never hard or didn't require "work", like buying a vanity item from the store for 5 bucks, I really don't feel attached to it. I don't find value in it.
You could definitly do that, one way is find the lowest level mob, probably near town, and grind on them until you hit max level. I am sure that would very hard to do, if you make it, that would be something to feel proud of.
There's a difference between a challenge and doing something stupid.
Becoming the No. 1 tennis player in the world = challenge
Trying to become the No. 1 tennis player in the world by playing without a racket and shoes = stupid
Does buying the best racket and shoes mean you will win the French Open?
It very well could be if the difference is big enough and the skill between the players is close. If you put Federer play against Nada, the latter using a wooden racket and sandals, the first using whatever top gear they use right now, who do you think will win?
Yes, but not every technology is seen as fair. This is why they banned certain swimsuits that were deemed to be too efficient in swimming contests.
I imagine that if they invent a racket that costs over 10 thousand dollars and gave such a large advantage that you would be forced to use it to stand a chance in winning competitions, that would cause them to revise the rules and maybe even ban it.
I have to say this is the best post ever. I see already seen that the fearful have started posting here proclaiming despite all the evidence to the contrary their fears about this game.
I noticed that about WoW when i first began playing mmo's. The people who i thought were my friends who got me started in the game (who also were responsible for three guild splits later on) were decidedly unrealistic in their expectations of a new player's knowledge of what to do where to go for info and how to gear up their character. Then i noticed there was a whole tier of elitest jerks later that just wanted nothing to do with you if you didn't have the best thing on (25 man raid gear) which at the time wasn't really that simple to get on your own.
I decided after the release of Cata that it was just too much craziness for me to handle so i moved my toons to an RP server which had a more high brow crowd to it i have to admit, and found old and new friends.
It amazes me that you are so on target with your statement about the tiny elite population being so scared. It happened in other games i played, one being LOTRO,, where with the introduction of skirmishes (solo duo dungeons) and a solo storyline which gave you a boost to elite power level to handle the mobs in some areas while on these quests, there was a tiny public outcry which soon quickly died. They then began focusing on pvp later.
I've noticed that about pvp as well. There was this sense of being elite in pvp which i think in the case of gear based pvp is the funniest thing. They want to get the best arena gear in WoW just to be able to gank people on and off the field. I noticed there are tons of rogues as well in WoW disproportionately to every other class and when the Rogue players complained about the power of the only class that gave them a run for their money, hunters, they were immediately nerfed not once but three times. It was not due to them actually being spotted by pets, or the ability of hunters to knock rogues around with certain pets, it was simply because they had lost the leetness they felt in playing such an imbalanced class. Just one of the reasons i simply refuse to pvp to this day because pvp is a straight guys epeen fantasy and nothing more.
here's how it works usually when these people are "threatened" by casuals:
devs change the structure of getting gear end game for dungeons
hardcore complaints mount up
hardccore players do the highest raids possible only instead of dungeons
devs make higher stat gear available so that everyone can see end game storylines
hardcore players complain
hardcore players move to pvp only
devs make it easier for players to enter pvp matchs more evenly matched with gear retrieved from pve crafting
hardcore players complain
the next expansion is released to do this pattern all over again
we see posts on websites like these about how terrible an older game is like AoC, WoW, LOTRO etc just because they made it easier for people with REAL LIVES
It's amazing to me that you had to be the one to announce what their problem on these forums really are. There's another thing as well that you didn't point out tho. And that's the fact that there are some people i've noticed who just can't seem to wrap around their head the math and facts of how things work. They either are so completely lost in their fears about how equal a game will make players that they say completely false statements that every fact will disprove yet they still accept their irrationality about the game. And then there are those who are so bent on supporting a game and it's company that no matter how many flaws you point out to them or how many examples you present with video footage etc, they are still bent on supporting a company who screwed over the gaming population by charging them for an unfinished product with a poor root design concept. These second set of people aren't getting paid by said company and don't have a future in that company yet every fact that's presented they feel the need to say it's not true, tell you go play something else, attack you personally, or tell you they'll add it later when they know for a fact it should have been there (the features) at launch for it to be a respectable product.
How would you classify those peoples' psychological profiles?
Tell me 1 game, ANY game where there isnt a winner and a loser. If u do that i will agree witht his post and support it. but u cant. so GG but gaming is for 1 player to show he is better then the other in whatever way it is.
Any RPG.
RPG's are not meant to so Black-White. RPG's are supposed to be ever changing, dynamic and focused on telling an engaging story and letting you live it out through a character in the world. I think you must be looking for FPS'ers or RTS's. Those games are about pwning noobs, but RPG's are always and will forever be about story first.
Unfortunately the leet minority would disagree with you because every game with the ten year old model is designed just for them, until companies like WoW discovered that casuals were more likely to stick with a game longer. Those people who usually play FPS and PVP games started migrating over to these larger filled with casuals games and demanded their tiny voice be heard which has lead to all manner of problems since they began.
I for one am very glad that Anet is keeping those people away from the rest of us, by making the code for pve and pvp different for skills (so when they balance i won't have to relearn my character entirely, i'm looking at you WoW), by making most worlds non-pvp so one doesn't have to worry about a rogue somewhere while farming for ore, and by making pvp a non gear based system so those who pvp aren't crazy overpowered and the devs don't have to spend extra time on gear to support ALL of the twenty pvp play styles and can concentrate on content for everyone.
Someone else covered this really nicely too in a thread I feel should be linked.
The whole point of this thread was to get the MMORPG traditionalists thinking, to get people asking whether there could be other demographics out there worth targeting - even to the point where there may be demographics worth targeting more than them. And if, perhaps, just by chance there are games being developed which aren't targeted at MMORPG traditionalists.
A lot of the confusion and anger with Guild Wars 2 is that it's a game which isn't designed for MMORPG traditionalists. ArenaNet has always been honest and up front about this, but it still leaves the traditionalists confused and angry. After so long of being treated as the target demographic, development houses are developing more, and more and ever more games which seem to be moving away from the MMORPG traditionalist demographic.
Some are doing it in small steps, some are doing it in much more wider strides, and this is exactly what this topic was created to look at. The problem is, right now, that MMORPG traditionalists have been so catered to for so long that they've developed an over-inflated sense fo self-entitlement and self-importance. This is what I've been building up to, and I feel that after the entire length of this thread, especially some of the nastier posts, it's pretty safe now to reveal my motivations.
It needs to be understood that not all games are going to be going after the people who played WoW and Everquest. In fact, as time goes on, chsaing those players may become increasingly less desirable. There have been two thoughts going around in development cycles at the moment and they are thus:
If you ignore any of WoW's development tenets, you're an idiot. WoW is what people want, it's what will bring in the money. Develop WoW and you gain success. (These words came from Bioware in regards to The Old Republic.)
WoW players won't easily abandon WoW. But then you have other groups, you have people who are sick of WoW and don't wnat to get caught up in time-sucking progression treadmills any more, you have people who love co-op games but want to see them on a larger scale, and you have lots of people who'd probably dig an MMORPG if you could take the base idea of the MMORPG (lots of people) and take it in a bold, new direction. It's risky, but we think it's even riskier to just be WoW. (These are words I've seen ArenaNet and some others muse upon in interviews.)
And that's how things are right now. With The Secret World, WildStar, and yes, Guild Wars 2 you have developers thinking the latter. With games like The Old Republic, you have developers thinking the former. The truth is is that the market is big enough for all of these games, and Guild Wars 2 absolutely does not have to be a game for obsessive progression fanatics. In fact, they're not the target demographic, not even remotely.
The point of this thread, belabouredly: The market is growing.
What that means is that the market is going beyond just the MMORPG traditionalists. Dio you remember videogames back in the 16-bit era and how they were as hard as nails, and only the most insanely skilled needed to apply? This is because you could have people play a game that was unfun for most people just to beat a level, just to feel they did. This is why difficulty levels were introduced to singleplayer games, difficulty levels that remain to this day.
But the division in MMORPGs isn't skill vs. no skill, it's lots of time vs. small amounts of time. The problem with the progression treadmill is that it's always required massive amounts of time. The reason for this is because in the progression treadmill, you get lots of padding and repeated content which you grind through. Some people may enjoy that and I'm not saying anything about that. But if you take someone from a co-op perspective and ask them to sit down and play a game for six hours to get to where they would be in a co-op game in an hour, then they're likely going to say "Uh, no."
This is why there's been a stark divide between MMORPG players and players of other games. But there's always been that curiosity there, that thought of 'well, if they weren't so grindy and padded then' and that's what the market is opening up to.
This is where we're going.
It's not exclusively where we're going. The sky isn't falling. The world isn't over. You're not dying. It just means that there's more variety for people who want different things. Again, the confusion is that that variety is starting to appear. And thus the traditionalists are asking "Well, why isn't this aimed at me any more?".
It's not all about you. It was for a bit, but not now.
Comments
@DeathAngell
You misunderstand the term 'equality.'
The game does have 'equality of chance,' which means that every person has a chance to get the same things, and through many different methods. This evens out the playing field.
And this thread continues to be proof positive that Guild Wars 2 is working.
If it wasn't...
What are the angry people here afraid of?
@BilboDoggins
You're coming across as really defensive. If the thread is so wrong, why the kneejerk, aggressive reaction? It reeks of fear.
Any RPG.
RPG's are not meant to so Black-White. RPG's are supposed to be ever changing, dynamic and focused on telling an engaging story and letting you live it out through a character in the world. I think you must be looking for FPS'ers or RTS's. Those games are about pwning noobs, but RPG's are always and will forever be about story first.
I am pretty damn sure I didnt spend my weekends 24+ years ago trying to beat people up, instead I was apart of something bigger then myself. Something that a Dungeon Master spent alot of time crafting and building up while I had fun living in his little world. Things like levels and skill aquisition were the main forms of accessing character progression and was never about aquiring that +9 Vorpal Sword of Dragon Slaying. RPG's in general and MMO's in particular are spiritual successors in good old fashion fantasy worlds that you want to live in......in other words its about having fun first and foremost.
Everything you need to know about Elder Scrolls Online
Playing: GW2
Waiting on: TESO
Next Flop: Planetside 2
Best MMO of all time: Asheron's Call - The first company to recreate AC will be the next greatest MMO.
This have nothing to do with casuals Vs no-lifers at all.
It is really about skill Vs time investment. Most mmos do reward people for grinding stuff instead of being good.
And some people are indeed at the top because they are good but surprisngly many just grind on to get a gear advantage.
MMOs should reward players for playing good, not for spending forever in a Wow battleground while sucking badly to gain points slowly.
I been playing mmos since M59 first released in '96 and the games have become more and more focused on gear while also becomming easier. Any moron can get a really powerful PvP armor by just keep playing for a long time and therefor get an advantage.
In GW2 you wont get that advantage just as you don't get it in gW and that will tick some people off badly, and not because it is "casual" but because the only thing that matters is how good player you are. Of course you will become better with practice but your achivements willbe yours, not your gears.
I agree that there will be plenty of crying though, but that will include some people that consider themselves "L33T" in other games.
I am no MMO newbie my friend. My roots go back to Darksun Online. We are basically the same (first) generation of MMO gamers. I have been around th block and played them all and I can see whats actually happening here and thats gamer group A have created a "boogieman" for why they are not as good as or accomplished as gamer group B.
That boogieman is the "elitists" or the raiders. They have convinced themselves these people are not actually better at the game but just have more time and that time enables them to get way better gear in which to beat up on them and steal their lunch money. The thing is that in some cases this may indeed be true. Some raiders are indeed not very good. They are known as "carries". But they are NEVER the majority in any decent raid force that actually accomplsihes anything. To pretend the majority of raiders are unskilled clowns able to just faceroll content because they have better gear is ridiculous. They are simply skilled gamers who know how to play the game. They also learn the ins and outs of their classes and how to play them effectively. The Raiding community is almost always the theorycrafters. The ones who "grind" the numbers and formultate the strategies (time investment is not just camping a mob btw). The ones who recruit other like-minded and equally skilled gamers and push content.
And heres where GW2 comes into play. Just because you subtract the gear from the equation will not remove the rest of what makes the raider playerbase good at gaming. Hell gear actually wont be subtracted from the equation, in fact it may play a bigger role than ever because the more knowledgeable theorycrafting raider will put together gear sets which are more efficient for their build. Will all raiders do this? No. But they will in much higher percentages than Joe Casual just like in every other game.
So what you will see happen here will be no different than other MMO's. Those who put in the time and effort and surround themselves with better players will be the ones beat crushing everyone. And I can guarantee you its not gonna be the scrubs who play 30 minutes a day and buy lots of gems in the cash shop to keep pace. It'll be the same crowd. The "raider" type, the casual boogieman. And what will Joe Casual do? He will cry and call for nerfs and say the boogieman has some unfair advantage because ______ <----Insert excuse there.
I think the main issue with people complaining about how MMORPG's should work is, they are focusing solely on the level / gear / crafting mechanics of the game.
One of the first Online Roleplaying Games I ever played was furcadia. It was nothing but a graphical MUD (multi user domain). It was still an RPG, because people really did roleplay in it.
This entire thread is talking about the level/gear mechanics of the game. That is where this competitive crap comes in. Everyone is completely missing the core elements of what make an RPG an RPG... character identity, community, personal growth.
I am one of those players who still has enough free time to be "uber" and get all the time-sink rewards. But I don't do it to compete with people. I do it because character growth is fun to me. That is why you are seeing so many first person shooters adopting this leveling / achievement system. Its because accomplishments are alot of fun in games. That is why it boggles my mind that some people pay others to level their character up to the cap in some MMORPGs. I have never played another persons account or ever purchased an account for a game, because playing the game doesn't feel right unless the character is mine and mine only, and I've been at the helm of the character for its entirety.
I once had a conversation with my friends about 6-7 years ago, back when we would lift weights. I said, "What is the only thing in the world most like an RPG character?"
- Time requirements
- Effort
// in exchange for //
- Visible signs of growth
- Increases in demonstratable power from growth
- Non-tangible, personal
The only thing I could think of in life that mirrored these aspects of RPG leveling up / character growth was weight lifting. There is nothing in life that I can think of, that has time and effort requirements, that give the person more power or skill, is visible to others without speaking/acting, and cannot be bought or traded. (This is assuming that your character in an RPG is not bought or traded.)
I guess I'm kind of straying off topic here. But my point is, MMORPG's must always have room for character growth. Thats whats truly important. Wether it be achievements or purple gear, or skill ups, there always needs to be room to grow. Now the carrot on the stick thing occured when Blizzard and other companies starting putting out expansions with green gear better then slightly lower level purples. Growth in MMORPG's is usually permanent, but the way end game raiding has been functioning lately, nothing you do or get will be worth while forever. It will only be good until the next expansion arrives.
A friend of mine still plays EQ1. And from what I heard, there is no "expansion trumping previous raids" type stuff. In order to do raid #32, you have to get the gear from raid #31, and before that, raid #30... etc etc. Correct me if I am wrong about this. But thats what EQ1 is supposedly still doing.
I guess a good way to look at how MMORPG's should be played is thinking of golf versus tennis. Tennis you can't play alone. Your skill is only measured by how you do compared to others. This is how many MMORPG's are being made now. They are becoming like Tennis matches. When really they should be played like Golf. Golf is not only a game with competition but a game where your personal best is important. You can play alone and still have alot of fun.
Anyways...umm.. I don't really have a conclusion so I'll just end here. But good post OP.
To some part, that is true. Many raiders are good players but i also know several raiders iRL that actually aren't that good. A certain someone whines on his guild (mostly his IRL friends) so he can join their raids, others have good social skills and use that.
In the earliest MMOs gear did matter, and time investentment but skills also mattered more than it does now. When someone that completly suck can beat someone that is really good only because of gear something is wrong.
I played a lot of GW and there good players always win, so I for one like this.
Then of course there probably is plenty of players who blame the ger for their own bad playing (I know more than a few of those as well) and they will probably be even agrier here.
But I first come from P&P RPGs and have played MMOs since the first gen and I have been worrying about the rising focus on gear since EQ. I think it is great that a AAA MMO finally releases without gear focus.
And yeah, I been doing my part of raiding but I got tired of the old hamsterwheel. The last year i only been playing GW and some old NWN in lan for multiplayer RPGing. Funny enough is it because I suddenly got more spare time so i can play P&P RPGs instead, but the choice of GW is because everything I succed with there is because me and my group did a good job, not what gear we have gotten.
There were plenty of grinding in old MMOs as well, but there it was to level up and for some reason tha felt a lot more fun than to get the next tier of gear.
I hope GW2 inspires devs to lessen the gear focus in MMOs.
After reading the OP's post in full I realized lots of it was off but its os much might aswell not go into detail on every little point. What has to be realized is that all the major release mmos since wow have been designed around casual including wow itself while trying to preserve elements for harc core players. Problem is raidng should not be the rule but the alternative much of the time since it tends to be a major time sink. Now to be fair some games have very short end games raids that require skill more than anything (dcuo comes to mind raids can take from 15 mins to 1 hour with the best teams). I think GW2 is already on track to dodge that problem but there will still be players who simply play better and more than ever will this become apparent . I mean you can give anybody some paper and pencil but what they do with it is up to them.
I'm sorry OP, but this game changes nothing in terms of what you're describing.
Starting with the cash model, this game is a F2P model (with a hefty entry price surprisingly) with a cash shop (which remains to be seen how P2win it will be). They follow the exact same model every other NCsoft game is currently following (all NCsoft games right now are F2P cash shop, just without the initial price, so they are even better monetised). So, not much of a change there, F2P games have been around for a while, quality F2P games start to emerge recently however.
As for the rest, time is the one resource noone has enough of. You and I don't know if we'll be alive tomorrow. Sure, we can amass a fortune and the older you get the (possibly) more you have, but the less actual time you have. So spending time in an MMO (or any other hobby activity) is actually quality time taken out of our short lives that is more important than money. And hobbies are supposed to be fun, so spending time on them should also be pleasant. Of course, depending on hobbies, they can be costy as well. But what defines their quality is not the amount of cash you spend on them, but the amount of fun you get out of them when you spend time on them.
Maybe it's me getting older and closer to the closure of my existence that makes me see the quality time I have as the most important aspect than any epeen and false pride that can be bought with cash.
I crave character progression more than anything and agree that progression nowadays is far to gear-centric. But the thing I prefer is stuff like EQ1 style AA systems which allow basically unlimited advancement. I knew I would never max out because I didnt have the time but you know what? I didnt care because I always had something I could do to progress my character. Shit, the same could be said of gear back then. Gear was harder to come by and chances are you would never get all the best pieces for your character. And you know? it was great because it gave me something to look forward to. The adventure didnt end. Progression didnt end. But we cant have those games anymore because the casuals cry "grind!" and "unfair" and "boring".
So Nowadays most games your character hits max level and cant progress further in that way. Gear is the only route and the items are relatively easy to acquire and you can deck out your guy in all the best stuff. In other words. The adventure ends.
Guess which game GW2 is?
But I know this and I will be playing GW2 as more of a MOBA/FPS like pvp game. That doesnt bug me. What does irk me is all the casual people here who think that because GW2 isnt like the first game I mentioned that they will somehow be as good as everyone else when the hard reality is that if they sucked and didnt have much time to play other MMO's then they will suck at GW2 as well. BUT...but this time they wont have their boogieman to blame. The bullshit QQ from their peanut gallery will be hilarious this time. And it will be baseless, unfounded garbage.
Well, more and more games are implementing some sort of horizontal advancement model without disgarding the gear upgrades. The most recent example is Rift I believe.Also TSW seem to be focusing on horizontal advancement as well, besides the obvious gear upgrades.
In any case, if AoC lack of meaninful gear upgrades at the launch of the game was any indication, people don't like gears to lose their value. That's the main reason the whole gear system was revamped in AoC and I'm sure it's been an educational experience for TSW as well, levels or lack of.
Thanks for the great post Dream Chaser.
However, I must say that it has nothing to do with being a "old mmo player" even I know that many love their habits to death and even still longing of some short of grinding in games for the said "shiny armor" you very well described.
It has to do with personal point of view and what one wants as also how much a person can adapt to changes.
I have alpha/beta tested and played around 300 mmos so far and being it sports, beat em up, rpg, strategy, puzzle or racing based or a mix of these, most of them had indeed most things in common and that was for the most part everything you stated.
Some that tried to stand out couldn't find enough interest and got shoved or cancelled because the old good "I can be better than you" aspects were missing (also because they weren't published well either to be honest).
2 of my old time favorite mmos ever, came out in 2004-2005 (city of heroes/villains and guild wars).
Both mmos were community friendly, were innovative and stylish (Sidekick system, the best character creation tools and no armor in CoH, personal involvment of your character in the story, strategical skill system among other things in gw).
Even the "Trinity" system were in place, it wasn't totally nessecary to progress in the game (except of a few spots in GW to be honest or partially in pvp).
The difference they both brought in the mmo world got loved by everyone that appreciated the innovation and hated by the ones that missed the "superiority".
I can't wait for GW2 and Archage to come out because both games will change quite a few things in the mmo world like CoH and Guild Wars did in the past.
Things that in my opinion will make developers (or at least I hope so) to start being more innovative and less afraid to bring up something new on the table instead of creating the next mmo clone with the same old features for the grinding neighbor to put his hands on 24/7.
Well percieved, and well said.
I myself hadn't seen it this way yet, but I think you just hit the bullseye. Totally agree.
This items and spells were usable only for PVP characters which had no access to PVE content or whatver content outside the PVP island. This was created so people can actually jump right into PVP without the need to ever go trough PVE and unlock spells trough PVE only to use them on PVP characters. That's the intention of that skill pack and items pack, not to force people to do PVE if they do not want to since those spells and items are only usable by PVP only characters and let them jump right into the pvping.
I don't agree it's a P2W, since if you don't play pve you can buy it as well, or if you play pve you'll get those items and spells anyway so you don't need to buy it since you already have everything.
"Happiness is not a destination. It is a method of life."
-------------------------------
While I agree with the prevailing points of the post, I don't know that GW2 has proven it will make all of the changes suggested here. A lot of what we have been told makes it sound that way, but until the mass market has evaluated the implementation of these features, I remain slightly skeptical (yet extremely excited about launch and playing it for myself).
Man you were asking for it! I havent read all the posted responses but I wouldn't be surprised if one of those die hard "I played WoW from beta" players didn't flame lol.
I agree with everything the OP said +1
The amount of whining from PvP'ers that consider themselves "leet" in other games is going to be something to behold. And I agree with you, we're going to see/hear plenty of it. Some people really hate games that don't have "superarmor," or a way to gain a sharp advantage over others. I think most of the people freaking out never played GW1 and don't fully realize that the days of skating by on epic gear are about to be over if they intend to play. You're really going to have to be GOOD now, not just have the most damage mitigation and crit rating on your gear.
Every GW2 thread that's started any more seems to devolve into pissing and moaning. It's really grating on my last nerve. I intend to enjoy the game regardless of the naysayers. Hell, I'm still playing SWTOR and enjoying it and I'm fairly certain that GW2 will be a better game.
Anyway....see you in game Loke.
President of The Marvelously Meowhead Fan Club
One of my prime hopes for Guild Wars 2 was that it would have people re-evaluate things, possibly on a large scale, that it would have people looking at stuff that occurs that we take for granted as part of the system. That it would shake things up and prove that things set in stone don't need to be set in stone.
I know what you mean. Stone-tablets are really unwieldy, and very expensive to have shipped from Amazon. I prefer an iPad, myself.
I'm familiar with the concept of a paradigm shift from a scientific viewpoint. Eventually something comes along, a new theorem that no one cares to accept, and then the evidence starts piling up in support of it and slowly you get more and more supporters. It really pisses people off, and everyone hates the change, but at the end of the day everyone still has a better understanding of the inner-workings of the Universe than they did prior.
Science? Cool! Maybe "Myth-busters" could do a show on MMORPGs?
And I really think that we need to do some deconstructionalist analysm of MMORPGs in general,
That may be outside of the scope of "Myth-busters". A shame really.
there are many things that we accept as set in stone that clearly... well, aren't. The accepted paradigm of the MMORPG has a linear flow to it, and one that many developers have been afraid to break. It's something that's been so ingrained via both classic conditioning (pavlovian responses) and oeprant (consequential) conditioning that people believe it has to go that way.
Come to think of it: I have been drooling over the GW2 beta-footage lately. Maybe you are right.
What those who play a singleplayer or co-op game expect is vastly different to what those who play an MMORPG accept. And I think that the MMORPG has fallen into an unhealthy, stagnant rut. So what do we accept?
• You pay a subscription.
Isn' it funny that "subscribe" is spelled with a "b", whereas "subscription" is spelled with a "p"?
• You can't buy anything of worth in the game with real money.
Well, that may be because it is almost impossible to find a gift shop which accepts Master Card in Doomlore Shrine.
• These time investements are massive and favour those without real life responsibilities or connections.
I know. Completely unrealistic.
• In order to substantiate these time investments, a 'carrot' is needed.
They say carrots are good for you eyes.
This is a fascinating concept. Not only because I can't really understand the appeal, but because of the divide it creates. First of all, I want to cover not understanding the appeal. The lack of appeal in my case is that I can't understand why you'd want to waste your life for a constant chain of 'carrots.'
Right on! To top it off they probably go on some gaming-forum and rant at everyone else about how stupid they are!
"So why are you raiding?"
"To get better gear."
"Which gives you?"
"Bigger numbers."
"Why do you need those?"
"The boss has bigger numbers."
"What do you get from the boss?"
"Better gear!"
"And what do you do with that?"
"Kill the next boss, duh!"
At least they speak in concise language.
The problem is is that not everyone is able to make these ridiculous time investments. You have people with children, a family, a job, social obligations, and so on. The sort of people who're considered 'casuals.' Now, the usual MMORPG talks about these people in derogatory ways, often considering them not 'leet' or not 'hardcore' enough. Because having a job and a child isn't 'hardcore.' So they sneer at such people and demand that the game be made more for them, creating more time investments.
True. The number of times I have had people sneer at me for not being a hardcore writer of long posts on gaming forums. Some of us have pet hamsters to look after!
But where did this begin?
I think you will have to take that up with your parents.
It all started off with subscriptions. In order to justify a subscription, you have to pad out content. This means that instead of a ten minute mission in Mass Effect 3, you're doing a five hour questing slog. Really, it shouldn't be that long, but it is. So you get to the quest vendor and they offer you these 'carrots,' these rewards. The idea here is that more weak-willed people get hooked on the idea of somehow, somehow being better than other people. In some small way... better.
In my experience the story about the bees and flowers works better. The fairytales collected by the Brothers Grimm are supposed to work as sex education by allegory, but this is too opaque for me.
in order to sneer down at those who don't have the same level of access to the game that they do. That's what it's all about. That shiny mount, that exclusive raid, that high-end armour? It's all to be better than someone else. One-upmanship, plain and simple. It's not a difficult concept.
Well, not for someone who uses words like "deconstructionalist" and "oeprant" as freely as you do.
At the power plateau, it won't matter if you've put eight hours into the game or eight thousand, you're all equal.
Well at the very least the latter is likely to have a better chance of developing arthritis than the former.
This is a terrifying concept to those who've ruled with time investments.
Never go for time-shares! They are not the investments they are touted as.
There are casual players out there just waiting for the MMORPGs that are designed for them to play. And those are on the way. One of the first is Guild Wars 2.
So there will be a sequel?
And like I said, it's working.
It is. I feel more equal already.
What Guild Wars 2 is doing is shaking things up, it's altering perceptions. It's saying that what was set in stone was an illusion, and that things can be completely different. Those who helped set those rules in stone are going to rail against that. Of course they are. No more exclusive content for them. Yes, that's going to suck for them. Because the reason they play an MMORPG, even in PvE, is just to be better than someone.
Interesting. I think the revivalists had the same thought. Are you related by any chance?
I mean, look at WoW.
Uhm. Maybe not. I am not supposed to look at WoW at work. It might also offend my female colleagues.
WoW, from the ground up, conditions you to want to be better than someone.
Absolutely. Nothing signals "I am better than you" like a "worn leather belt".
It puts in various ways to force you to compete. You can easily accidentally flag yourself as PvP, resource nodes are instancedglobally rather than per player, which makes people fight over them, and the whole thing is one massive sociopathic circlejerk.
I don't recall seeing any jerking (circle or otherwise) in WoW. Isn't it more of a Second Life-thing?
It's just people being horribly indecent to each other. But again, the old MMORPG player, the time investor, they're comfortable with that.
Personally I was never very comfortable with indecent exposure in WoW. Fortunately the gear-fixation with armour ensures that people remain decently covered most of the time. That is one advantage, you will have to grant me that!
In Guild Wars 2 they'll actually have to socialise with people, they'll have to be nice, they won't be in complete control, they'll be equal. This turns everything they know on its head. And that's why we've had so many threads about this. It's old MMORPG players damn near having a brain aneurysm at all of the rules they thought they knew being turned upon their heads.
Are you sure it isn't just all that circle-jerking causing hyper-tension?
No longer lords and ladies. Just peons. Like the rest of us.
You are saying GW2 will be like Warcraft 3, then?
They have to come back down to the real world.
Would that be the world of Tyria?
But what we're getting instead now is that they're seeing the other side of the equation. Just because there's equality, they're blowing it out of proportion and saying that money ivnestors will be on top. That's obviously not the case, but that's the fear that they have, because they're having these crazy slippery slope theories.
I know what you mean. I guess it's just math-anxiety, though. Still, not being able to distinguish a homogenous from a non-homogenous linear equations... That's just dumb.
The results are frankly hilarious.
I wholeheartedly agree.
If I were a vindictive person, I'd pester ArenaNet to actually include an $80 monocle in the game, just so that I could buy it, wear it, and flaunt it at the time investors. But I'm not a vindictive person. Like I've said before, my approach to the game will be to find the most sensible, utilitarian armour I can and stick with that. I don't really give a shit about being the prettiest pony on the block.
Good thing you are such a unassuming person!
If you are going to play Charr, you most assuredly will not be prettiest anything on the block (no offence). I also didn't like Worgen with top-hats, so I may be biased. In any case, flaunting a cosmetic item you paid $80 for would ruin any act of vindictiveness, I am afraid.
But if you understand the paradigm shift, here, if you understand how the patterns are changing, then you understand why every one of these new threads exists. It's forcing people to question all that was supposedly set in stone about GW2. And like I said, that says to me... GW2 works. I am pleased.
Yes! We are of the same mind, I think. The first Matrix was by far the best movie!
/Best
Cheopa
It very well could be if the difference is big enough and the skill between the players is close. If you put Federer play against Nada, the latter using a wooden racket and sandals, the first using whatever top gear they use right now, who do you think will win?
Yes, but not every technology is seen as fair. This is why they banned certain swimsuits that were deemed to be too efficient in swimming contests.
I imagine that if they invent a racket that costs over 10 thousand dollars and gave such a large advantage that you would be forced to use it to stand a chance in winning competitions, that would cause them to revise the rules and maybe even ban it.
I have to say this is the best post ever. I see already seen that the fearful have started posting here proclaiming despite all the evidence to the contrary their fears about this game.
I noticed that about WoW when i first began playing mmo's. The people who i thought were my friends who got me started in the game (who also were responsible for three guild splits later on) were decidedly unrealistic in their expectations of a new player's knowledge of what to do where to go for info and how to gear up their character. Then i noticed there was a whole tier of elitest jerks later that just wanted nothing to do with you if you didn't have the best thing on (25 man raid gear) which at the time wasn't really that simple to get on your own.
I decided after the release of Cata that it was just too much craziness for me to handle so i moved my toons to an RP server which had a more high brow crowd to it i have to admit, and found old and new friends.
It amazes me that you are so on target with your statement about the tiny elite population being so scared. It happened in other games i played, one being LOTRO,, where with the introduction of skirmishes (solo duo dungeons) and a solo storyline which gave you a boost to elite power level to handle the mobs in some areas while on these quests, there was a tiny public outcry which soon quickly died. They then began focusing on pvp later.
I've noticed that about pvp as well. There was this sense of being elite in pvp which i think in the case of gear based pvp is the funniest thing. They want to get the best arena gear in WoW just to be able to gank people on and off the field. I noticed there are tons of rogues as well in WoW disproportionately to every other class and when the Rogue players complained about the power of the only class that gave them a run for their money, hunters, they were immediately nerfed not once but three times. It was not due to them actually being spotted by pets, or the ability of hunters to knock rogues around with certain pets, it was simply because they had lost the leetness they felt in playing such an imbalanced class. Just one of the reasons i simply refuse to pvp to this day because pvp is a straight guys epeen fantasy and nothing more.
here's how it works usually when these people are "threatened" by casuals:
devs change the structure of getting gear end game for dungeons
hardcore complaints mount up
hardccore players do the highest raids possible only instead of dungeons
devs make higher stat gear available so that everyone can see end game storylines
hardcore players complain
hardcore players move to pvp only
devs make it easier for players to enter pvp matchs more evenly matched with gear retrieved from pve crafting
hardcore players complain
the next expansion is released to do this pattern all over again
we see posts on websites like these about how terrible an older game is like AoC, WoW, LOTRO etc just because they made it easier for people with REAL LIVES
It's amazing to me that you had to be the one to announce what their problem on these forums really are. There's another thing as well that you didn't point out tho. And that's the fact that there are some people i've noticed who just can't seem to wrap around their head the math and facts of how things work. They either are so completely lost in their fears about how equal a game will make players that they say completely false statements that every fact will disprove yet they still accept their irrationality about the game. And then there are those who are so bent on supporting a game and it's company that no matter how many flaws you point out to them or how many examples you present with video footage etc, they are still bent on supporting a company who screwed over the gaming population by charging them for an unfinished product with a poor root design concept. These second set of people aren't getting paid by said company and don't have a future in that company yet every fact that's presented they feel the need to say it's not true, tell you go play something else, attack you personally, or tell you they'll add it later when they know for a fact it should have been there (the features) at launch for it to be a respectable product.
How would you classify those peoples' psychological profiles?
What did I just read? I'm all misty eyed and ready to rally my fellow casualites into a 99% occupation! Epic post! +a gazillion
Someone else covered this really nicely too in a thread I feel should be linked.
The whole point of this thread was to get the MMORPG traditionalists thinking, to get people asking whether there could be other demographics out there worth targeting - even to the point where there may be demographics worth targeting more than them. And if, perhaps, just by chance there are games being developed which aren't targeted at MMORPG traditionalists.
A lot of the confusion and anger with Guild Wars 2 is that it's a game which isn't designed for MMORPG traditionalists. ArenaNet has always been honest and up front about this, but it still leaves the traditionalists confused and angry. After so long of being treated as the target demographic, development houses are developing more, and more and ever more games which seem to be moving away from the MMORPG traditionalist demographic.
Some are doing it in small steps, some are doing it in much more wider strides, and this is exactly what this topic was created to look at. The problem is, right now, that MMORPG traditionalists have been so catered to for so long that they've developed an over-inflated sense fo self-entitlement and self-importance. This is what I've been building up to, and I feel that after the entire length of this thread, especially some of the nastier posts, it's pretty safe now to reveal my motivations.
It needs to be understood that not all games are going to be going after the people who played WoW and Everquest. In fact, as time goes on, chsaing those players may become increasingly less desirable. There have been two thoughts going around in development cycles at the moment and they are thus:
If you ignore any of WoW's development tenets, you're an idiot. WoW is what people want, it's what will bring in the money. Develop WoW and you gain success. (These words came from Bioware in regards to The Old Republic.)
WoW players won't easily abandon WoW. But then you have other groups, you have people who are sick of WoW and don't wnat to get caught up in time-sucking progression treadmills any more, you have people who love co-op games but want to see them on a larger scale, and you have lots of people who'd probably dig an MMORPG if you could take the base idea of the MMORPG (lots of people) and take it in a bold, new direction. It's risky, but we think it's even riskier to just be WoW. (These are words I've seen ArenaNet and some others muse upon in interviews.)
And that's how things are right now. With The Secret World, WildStar, and yes, Guild Wars 2 you have developers thinking the latter. With games like The Old Republic, you have developers thinking the former. The truth is is that the market is big enough for all of these games, and Guild Wars 2 absolutely does not have to be a game for obsessive progression fanatics. In fact, they're not the target demographic, not even remotely.
The point of this thread, belabouredly: The market is growing.
What that means is that the market is going beyond just the MMORPG traditionalists. Dio you remember videogames back in the 16-bit era and how they were as hard as nails, and only the most insanely skilled needed to apply? This is because you could have people play a game that was unfun for most people just to beat a level, just to feel they did. This is why difficulty levels were introduced to singleplayer games, difficulty levels that remain to this day.
But the division in MMORPGs isn't skill vs. no skill, it's lots of time vs. small amounts of time. The problem with the progression treadmill is that it's always required massive amounts of time. The reason for this is because in the progression treadmill, you get lots of padding and repeated content which you grind through. Some people may enjoy that and I'm not saying anything about that. But if you take someone from a co-op perspective and ask them to sit down and play a game for six hours to get to where they would be in a co-op game in an hour, then they're likely going to say "Uh, no."
This is why there's been a stark divide between MMORPG players and players of other games. But there's always been that curiosity there, that thought of 'well, if they weren't so grindy and padded then' and that's what the market is opening up to.
This is where we're going.
It's not exclusively where we're going. The sky isn't falling. The world isn't over. You're not dying. It just means that there's more variety for people who want different things. Again, the confusion is that that variety is starting to appear. And thus the traditionalists are asking "Well, why isn't this aimed at me any more?".
It's not all about you. It was for a bit, but not now.
The market is growing.
/thread
(WildStar link fixed!)
Haven't ever played GW, but your post brought up many great points. I'll definitely give GW 2 a shot.
TheNewGuy: Ultima Online (Catskills)
Years of anger bitterness and online flame wars beautifully summed up in a few sentences. Well said indeed.