Rate GW2 2018

2018 is at its end. We know for sure that no new releases (except gem store items) will be out untill January sooo...How would you rate GW2's 2018 in terms of new releases, compared to last year (2017) and previous ones?Try to point out in comments what you liked/disliked of this year.

Let's sum up the new releases of 2018, only for PvE since I don't follow other modes (forgive me if I forget something):

• Big impact releases
• 1. 3 LSs episodes (+stuff related).
• 2. 1 New Fractal
• 3. 1 New Raid
• Minor Releases
• 1. Chairs.
• 2. QoL updates towards (hopefully) build templates (like sigil swap on legendaries, changing skills in combat, etc).
• 3. Urderwater revamp.
• 4. Roller Beetle races.

I voted 6, the sufficiency, it would've been higher if it was another game but not GW2, because this is the bare minimum for a game like GW2 but it's not nearly enough to keep it alive for the next years.

I really wanted to give it a 10 as much as I love GW2 and the content ArenaNet has provided over the years. From the personal story to some of the Living World chapters, the combat system, the festivals etc. I love everything the game has to offer, but my biggest gripe currently is the profession balancing, regardless of game mode.

ArenaNet talks all the time about wanting to have build variety and don't get me wrong, I would love to see more build variety for every profession, but for some reason it takes them way too long to accomplish this. I've lost count of the amount of times I had to argue with meta elitists when I try to join their raid group.

I liked the roller beetles(not really interested in races, though). What else was there? Uh, the world boss teleport was nice. Maybe some gem store stuff? I've spent more time playing this year, but the good stuff was all released prior to this year. The episodes have felt mostly uninteresting. Even though the armor looked good, I somehow can't bring myself to actually spend any time on getting to it(unlike carapace/bladed armor). I find fractals/raids to be less fun than watching paint dry. The chair-penning felt like a joke. If it wasn't for the roller beetles, my answer would have been like 2/3? Wow, I've been enjoying the game, but I didn't realize how little I liked this year's content until this post(rather, it feels there wasn't much). Has it really been a year?

A comparison between 2017 and 2018 isn't really fair because in 2017 we got an expansion. However, excluding the expansion we got:

Festivals: 2018 had Festival of the Four Winds as extra festival, Super Adventure, Shadow of the Mad King and Wintersday are common, 2018 is betterEpisodes: 2018 had 3 episodes, 2017 had 4 episodes, 2017 was betterFractals: 2018 has 1 new Fractal, 2017 had 2 fractals one of them with a CM version, 2017 was betterRaids: 2018 had 1 Raid wing, 2017 had 2 Raid wings, 2017 was betterLegendary items: 2018 gave us 3 new legendary weapons, 2017 had 5 legendary weapons, 1 legendary accessory, 1 legendary backpack and various versions of legendary armor, 2017 was better

When comparing similar things it does look like 2018 is empty, especially considering that 2017 had an expansion too. I do hope 2019 will be much more content rich year for the game, otherwise there will be serious question where is the man power and resources going to. Edit: Other than mount skins of course

If we're talking about "new releases" only, 2018 was lackluster. I expected at least one more living world episode and one more new map with an open world meta that is on Istan's and SW's level (profitable). We got HoT improvements after its release so I also expected PoF improvements (meta events, less agressive mobs for better travelling on the maps, etc) but that never happened. Serpents' Ire is still a mess. I was excited about the new personal instance that came out with the last episode but it was so insignificant I even forgot its name, lol.

On the other hand, 2018 was the year when I rerolled as a Firebrand main, did full map and story completion, unlocked tons of Heavy armor skins (I only had a few), finally got every PvP title (except for the new Djinn one), I still enjoy the old meta events and do them on a daily basis, etc. Sooo the OLD STUFF are still awesome and make me log in every day BUT if we only look at the NEW stuff we got in 2018, it was an underwhelming year, tbh.

Would have been higher except now we’re not getting the next episode until January, we’ll after the 3 month make AGAIN

Gave it a 9/10 since there's only one game I consistently want to play more. :P

Not fond of the story additions this year but the gameplay is solid. Better rewards would have offset the poor story to some extent.

would have given a 10 if not for unbalanced patches

Good:

• Mythwright Gambit‎‎
• Roller Beetle were fun, even if only for few days

Bad:

• Just one raid wing this year
• Just one fractal this year
• Only ~~two ~~three Living World episodes this year
• Time wasted on things like chairs or underwater revamp
• Balance patches were just a joke on Chronos, change gear and/or learn new rotation every few months

Overall very bad year with almost no new content added to game.

Edit: Sorry, I forgot Bug in the System was released in March

I like GW2 for the story and open world pve especially. PVE is the strong point of the game and what keeps me here. 8/10 for PVE from me. They need more balance work, but I really like what the balance team is doing this year as well.

@Opopanax.1803 said:I like GW2 for the story and open world pve especially.

Same, open world PvE is what makes me log in every day and I'm always hyped for more story! <3

I voted for 6 because there were only 3 Living World episodes this year compared with 4 in 2017.

voted for 6, the only relevant content for me released this year was wing 6. without my ingame friends i would have left already. step up your game, not a lot of friends left to keep me playing sadly.

xxxxxxxxxx

Gw2 is significantly better than it was a year ago and that seems to be a common trend with this game as the years continue to pass.

Each year the game just gets bigger and better and I love it ^^

When I was playing Living world season 3 I was thinking back on Living world season 2 and saying to myself.. damn I remember when Living world season 2 was so awesome compared to season 1..I'm having the exact same thing again with Season 4 compared to season 3 XDWill I have the same thing again with Season 5?.. yeah I probably will if the last 6 years are anything to go by lol

This game just continues to get more epic with each season.. so I find it really difficult to think back to a previous year and say.. yea the game was better then..I cannot justify such a statement.

Gw2 still has it's problems for sure but for me as someone who's been playing this franchise for almost it's entire lifespan I am very happy with it.

9 because things can always get better. I've enjoyed the new living world episodes and Poi a lot though, and the guild I'm in has still been active too.

6 for me, 2018 was a empty year with a few highlights and not enough new things to do, whats worse is the game's economy and everything being so cheap that it takes away from the value of getting items, it's hardly special anymore.

I'm already on a extended break because of this, i really would want to come back and see changes to the core system of the game to make things more interesting and once krakal is dead at some point, focus on a entirely new story arch, we been riding dragon stories for 6 years, like something new would be great.

I dont know, we seen Anet do 3 really different stories in guild wars 1 in a couple of years and here we are still shelling dragon stories and its hardly exciting, anyhow there are things that need to be done and i think Arenanet doesn't care enough to do it.

I think the game is decent, but things have not been as good since PoF release.

Story, while production quality has improved the story overall has been worse.

Class balance is frequent, but also has been lacking in many respsects. Anet knows when something out perform, but does little to understand why. This is why we see the same build, and sometimes the same skill keep getting patched. To be fair, this is not a 2017 only issue.

New maps are a hit and miss, but overall lack replay ability.

It is overall an okay effort, but surely last 2 years where better.

I gave it a 9... I am still having fun on a regular basis, and they've added more stuff to do than I have time to complete.

A rating without context means nothing. Unless every player that voted explains in detail why they gave the score they did, there is no way to understand the result.

The new LS episodes have been good for the most part (aside from the few things missing from episode 3). Mount skins continue to be outstanding, and the return to Labyrinthine Cliffs was very welcome. I'm a bit more ambivalent about chairs and novelties, though it was nice to clear some bank space as a result.

I seldom play fractals and never play raids, so no updates to those were relevant to me. PvP/WvW I would play if they were good, but there are no new game modes in the works for either of them to hold my interest. The only class balance change that was particularly memorable to me was the Mesmer illusion rework, which continued to push the denial aspect of the class that made it so distinctive in GW1 toward irrelevance. Across-the-board power creep largely continues unabated, so the competitive game modes are still deeply unsatisfying to play.

While the PvE content was very good for a non-expansion year, it's hard for me to score it any higher than a 6, given I used to play WvW primarily and I've largely stopped playing it during 2018 - as a result GW2 is not my main game for the first time since it launched. So, a 6 it is.

It's a solid 6.5.

Things could be better, but they could also be 9 months of sitting on our hands waiting for a sign of life again.

I gave it 8.

Some notes,The AI is terrible and is compensated with lots of hp and lots of damageAlthough the recent update trimmed some of the monkey traits like mirrored anguish and elixer "OMG I almost died rofl invul" there still is a lot of work to do.The raid entrance barrierLots of busy work type collection achievements (hello wayfarer backpack)