Pink.9672

I love the female set, and the weapons in general. My pink Sylvari boy doesn't really suit the outfit at all (few outfits look greeeat on him), but I have a pink haired Norn Ranger named Artemis and she got the full outfit and a long bow. XD

Focusing a discussion on a hypothetical GW3 can be confrontational in nature. It proposes, essentially, the complete or near complete halt to GW2 production, so anyone who is a fan of GW2 isn't likely to jump on board a utopian version of a future game that likely would never live up to each person's own hype. Additionally, people in this thread have all pointed out a lot of very good information and reasoning behind their feelings, opinions, and just the facts of the game. Clearly ANet is putting a lot of resources into the dx9 to 11 upgrade. And the logic of that, and a new expansion, is that GW2 is going to be around for years to come. The game looks outdated to you? Okay. That's fine, but that's also your opinion on it. It could just as easily be defined as stylistic choice. Yes, WoW upgraded graphics (though often it's textures and not actual meshes). I looked at some of the character model changes between live and classic (as I only ever played back when classic was the thing) and... like I really had to stare at the Blood Elf to even see the darn difference. Sure, if you've stared at your character for 10 years and then they change the look, even slightly, you're going to notice. But in a lot of instances texture upgrades to actual characters is going to appear pretty minimal. Not because they can't necessarily make nicer skins (hello exclusive kit faces and hair), but because changing any of the existing ones also means you are messing with what people have chosen as their characters. Hence, it would make way more sense to add more face models/textures to the game and potentially give a free makeover kit per character after a big release than it would be to actually change any of the original pieces. In the terms of highly important NPCs, they could either leave them the same or give them more unique faces. This is still very doable inside of GW2, thus, people are going to point that out. Maybe GW2's feels outdated to you. But to me, coming in just last month, I find the game beautiful. I'm still hardcore into XIV, but I love the character designs, movement, and the mount animations in GW2 so much. So many things are incredibly beautiful, and I would say some aspects are far superior to other games. The world is also gorgeous. And sure, everything can be improved in one way or another. But there's a difference in saying something is outdated and something is modern within its style. People have pointed out that expansions have looked different from the base game. It's unlikely that we will ever see massive graphical changes to GW2 even if they were feasible and cost effective, because the game as it stands now is what people that are playing are used to and generally like. The risk in alienating players with any major changes is unlikely to be a benefit to the game. People still play GW1 and FFXI. People still watch movies from the 30s. I've watched plenty of anime from the 80s and 90s. Just because something can be done "better" in a variety of different ways doesn't mean that the older product isn't good anymore. Sure, I'm totally with you on graphics being a really engaging aspect of the games I play. There are a lot of games I really won't touch, even though they are probably good in and of themselves, because they don't look great. And I've never really been big on 8-bit and 16-bit at all. But I think there is still an argument to be made for actually "outdated" graphics, and working within a chosen style. We are likely going to see graphical upgrades to textures, if not retroactively, at least in newer content. And as time permits, they may work backwards as well. Any game is "outdated" the second it is released, realistically, because there is always another game in development using better engines, better designs, betting lighting, better mocap, better AI, etc. Just because it was made a decade ago doesn't mean it can't still look good. But cost and profit are huge factors here. The cost associated to the artistic work on upgrading all the textures is huge. And would the pay off be high enough to warrant that cost? Would slightly better visuals retain more players? Would it draw in enough new players who would also spend money on the game? Or, is it more cost effective to put those same artists to work on new maps, new skins, new mounts, etc? Let's me honest here. It's the latter. A new expansion, which has to be bought, is a way better use of resources and has a much higher chance to bring in more money for the company, increase player retention, and draw in new players. As for the whole "we didn't fight a dragon in PoF"... the whole point is that the fight itself wasn't against a dragon. Not that dragons played no role in it, or didn't have any background lore to it. You can have a whole story that focuses on different mechanics, enemies, and themes, while still having the core history and belief structures remain in place. You specifically said that we should have an enemy aside from dragons. And they have done that. Just because dragons have played a role in the core history of the entire world forever, essentially, doesn't mean we haven't fought other things. And just because those other things/people have goals that are associated in some way to the dragons doesn't mean their arcs and fights aren't any more or less important to our story than a fight against an Elder Dragon. With the guilds/alliances...I dunno. I never would have been big on that type of content and based on what others have said about the rivalry and toxicity they created in GW1 I can understand why they wanted to distance themselves from that sort of content. I definitely prefer PvE elements in general and teaming up with my fellows against the environment and npcs over anything that really pits player against player. However, I think that content still has a place in MMOs. It just seems shocking hard to implement well. Of the few things I really liked in WoW, the large capture the flag style PvP was really fun for me. And that was while doing the same map for ages to get my white wolf mount. So, it was fun even after ridiculous repetition. Public housing with neighbourhoods is...literally one of the worst ideas ever. I say this because, like I said, hardcore XIV. And we have literally the most resource heavy, broken housing system in existence. A neighbourhood with a low draw distance isn't going to do anything other than make it easier for your computer to load things in as you go. They still have to maintain the entire neighbourhood(s) as active instances because people could be running around them at all times (which...no, they almost never do in reality. Those places are dead. -_-). It's a ridiculously resource hog and thus also generally limited in some way. How many neighbourhoods do they add? How many lots per neighbourhood? Do they limit the housing plots to different sizes? Are people then limited to whatever size they can get? Or, do you make every plot the same size and make it all really uniform and bland so that everyone can upgrade and decorate equally? Instanced housing with an outdoor area within that instance is by far the way to go. If you want to randomly visit people's instances who have them open, that would be fine. If people want to do "neighbourhood jaunts" streaming on Twitch as they explore people's instanced housing, that would also be great. But....physical zones of player housing is THE WORST THING EVER. It is literally one of the most loathed things on FFXIV, including by a lot of people that have houses! The whole things with "skins that fit the world" thing is also very self-centered. Your take on the world may not be at all in line with what others think. And, it's an MMO where people are supposed to create these amazing, fantastical heroes. I am actually super, super unhappy that the Charr have such limited fur colors. It is a world where magic and illusion and dyes are everywhere. Everything one can imagine is basically possible. And you want to strangle creativity because it doesn't match your view of a proper hero in the world's setting? Doesn't matter if one is RPing or not. If I want my super pink little plant boy to wear the brightest, most garish colors I can think of while riding a ridiculous pixel mount then that's my business. Realistically, in the canon every other PC either doesn't exist or are "random adventures" that you have gathered for a specific purpose, like almost every MMO. And like almost every MMO customization is highly, highly valued. And finally, it's completely fine to abandon a thread. However, do not blame the people that responded to you just because you didn't get want you wanted from the thread. You had every opportunity to judge what you were getting in the responses and either edit your initial post, or change course in the comments and join everyone else in their discussion on how a lot of the things that you wanted to implement could have been done in GW2. Instead you doubled and tripled down on your own opinions, blind to a clear consensus being offered to you. You stopped the discussion by not engaging with people. All you did was reiterate your points ad nauseam when clearly the vast majority of people just weren't on board with it. This could well have evolved into a decent discussion on how to improve a game that clearly those old and new still greatly appreciate. Instead it felt more like a lot of people talking to one very annoyed person who was sitting there with their arms crossed just going "nuh-uh!" at every response.

From what I understand, GW2 has settled into the roadmap of content updates every 3 month, which falls in line with the update schedule of FFXIV. As someone who has played FFXIV for years and technically started the day it was launched, I've been around and aware of it since it came into being, even if my main stint of playing didn't start until the Heavensward expansion. Further to that, I have years of FFXI under my belt, a decent meander through WoW back in the days of Burning Crusade (which I think is considered Classic now), and Ultima Online way back in the day. I think we also have to admit that no MMO is perfect, not in general terms and not in personal terms. And quite frankly, that lack of perfection is completely needed for any MMO to even be successful. Something one person wants won't be what another person wants. Hence, the game attempts to give us a variety of side content and incentives outside of the core story. If every single person agreed on one thing that they wanted, they could dedicate way more resources to that thing, and everyone would be very happy. But that will never happen. Instead, every MMO tries to guess (or takes requests seriously) and creates smaller pieces of different content to appeal to different players within their game. Even if FFXIV is still my favorite game that doesn't mean I can't see its many flaws. And I can even understand that other people see flaws in it that I will never see. This is the same of WoW, GW2, Tera, and all the others that hold some healthy level of popularity. I will say that GW2 has a very healthy population. MMOs are a niche side of gaming, and due to the usual time investment related to them, people who play MMOs in general will gravitate to one. I've played XI and WoW at the same time (I know, two sub based ones) and you still usually end up spending more time on one than the other. I'm quite new to GW2, but I am good friends with someone who's been around since pre-launch, and loves GW2 above all other games. We've had great conversations about population within the various "big name" MMOs, the strength of retention based on the numbers versus the internet hype trains, and various things around the game in general. Right now, the numbers are on the rise, but they aren't peaking either. And even if there is not massive retention from these new numbers, GW2 still holds a very healthy population in the 1-1.5mil player range. When it comes to bettering the game, a lot of us tend to focus on just getting what we want. And a lot of the time we associate with other players who play or think the same way we do. If I loved PvP (ha) and my friend loved making characters and redoing the 1-80 grind over and over again... we probably wouldn't have the same opinion on what we want out of the game. PvP also seems to be a thing in MMOs that either sucks absolute balls, or is really fun. FFXI and XIV? Yeah, it's in the suck category. That doesn't mean people don't still do it, and some that do genuinely do like it. But it's widely considered to be a lesser factor in the game, and thus it does tend to get lesser priority. There are certain modes more popular than others, and you can tell when they are trying to use feedback versus try something new. But it's still mainly something people do once a day via roulette for the bonus and then ignore it. And that's literally only if they want the gear they can buy for 100% aesthetic reasons. I know my friend did really enjoy PvP back in the day, before Elite specializations came in and everything sort of had to get retooled. But if I heard there was going to be some big PvP update that would do nothing for me. On the other hand, when I heard there was going to be fishing, I was super excited. I love fishing in games. I fish in every game that has it. The only one I haven't enjoyed was WoW's. Within the first couple days of playing GW2, prior to any EoD announcement, I asked if there was fishing in the game. Fishing as an added feature is really cool to me. A lot of people might think that is a stupid feature. But to others, like me, this is wanted. And it just happens that this one part of EoD happens to cater to players with that interest. It's important, just as important as other facets of the game. And even if I don't care about PvP, or most of the Specializations, I am still exceptionally happy that other players, different from me, are potentially getting something to make them happy. Circling back to the release schedule, a lot of other people in the thread have clarified actual length between updates/patches/expansions, and some behind the scenes things. I think all of us can pretty much throw 2020 out the window when it comes to our MMOs. Regardless of what got released, when, and what got cut, I feel like 2020 is just a gimme year for a lot of industries. And even a good half of 2021. So, GW2 came out August 28, 2012. Heart of Thorns came out October 23, 2015. Path of Fire came out September 22, 2017. And End of Dragons is expected to drop in February 2022. So, release, little over 3 years for first expansion, then 2 years for the second, and then End of Dragons is about 4.5 (or 3.5 if we want to be generous with deleting 2020). And, within that time there was also Living World Season 1, 2, 3, 4, and IBS. And people can judge the quantity or quality of each thing as they wish. We are generally to biased to really judge these things individually based on memory because we will value things we liked more highly and devalue things we don't, or even claim them as a wasted addition. If we look at FFXIV as a comparison we have release on September 30, 2010. And then that thing bombed harder than Scarlet lost her mind. After a lot of chaos, people stepping down, new people being hired, and an entire new game being made while the broken one was being made slightly less broken, FFXIV A Realm Reborn came out on August 24, 2013--Essentially 3 years to remake the base game. After the game succeeded this time around we get the first expansion of Heavensward on June 23, 2015. Then Stormblood June 20, 2017, Shadowbringers July 2, 2019, and the upcoming Endwalker November 23, 2021. FFXIV has a very standardized format of release. We generally know exactly how things are going to go. Generally we have patches x.1 to x.5, and between those be might see the occasional x.25 or x.56. We know that over the span of the 2 years between expansions we will see three sets of four 8-man raids released. We know we will see, generally seven 8-man Trials that will have Extreme modes that drop a mount with different colors (horses, wolves, birds, dragons, etc). We know we will see three 24-man raids released all with a central theme. We know how many dungeons we will see, how many new sets of gear to expect. We know exactly how to get each set we need, how to most effectively collect gear from weekly lock outs, and how to most effectively farm each part of the progression cycle. It is pretty predictable, and while a subscription based income (plus a cash shop for aesthetics) can guarantee a level of income and staff, I don't think GW2 lacks on those assurances at all. Like I said, GW2 has a healthy player population, and with its lifespan being almost a decade, you can be sure that ANet has the stats on how much money they are bringing in. From what I understand, they even said that based on the money that has come in from the cash shop, they would never need to charge for an expansion to keep the game running. However, charging for the expansion did allow them to dedicate the level of time and detail they wanted to achieve in said expansions and beyond in the Living World side of things. Now, I have only been here on GW2 a month. I'm a little baby sprout of a Sylvari. I haven't experienced everything as it was released. I didn't get to spend hours with you guys in Discord, or Facebook, or on here theory crafting week after week as the living world was updated around us. But, I have played the personal story. I have gotten 100% map completion of Core Tyria. I have detoured to PoF for my first 4 mounts. I have watched about 4.5 hours outlining LW S1 with Scarlet. And I've been playing LW S2. Right now I am very much focusing on the story. I am ignoring WvW, PvP, achievements, side quests, etc. I've played probably 200 hours in a month. Why yes, that is more than my full time job. Would someone who doesn't care about map completion or who doesn't find the success of completing a map find value in what I chose to focus on? No. A lot of people might have jumped to 80 and hyper focused on Ascended or Legendary gear and jumped right into high end Fractals. Again, we all might play differently. And just because someone might be at the same place as me in the story in a smidgen of the time, doesn't mean that the maps and the method of creating the world in GW2 isn't highly valuable. One thing I think GW2 and FFXIV have in common, very much in common, is that neither game expects to have all your time. So many companies these days want to use this Live Service Model to keep you in their game as long as possible, while also releasing another game every year and somehow wanting you to put all your time there as well. FFXIV gates progression to make sure people don't gear zerg everything in a week. But they do also release those lockouts in a reasonable time and allow people to grind, or... just leave for a bit. Patch drops, pay for a month, finish your main job, unsub for 2, repeat. If you only care about savage raids, you can generally cut that log in requirement by half the patches. FFXIV doesn't even incentivize you to think you have to stay. They literally have said to players it's totally okay to go enjoy other games. And I feel this is very true for GW2 as well. This is a fantastic game, but it doesn't make you feel like if you leave for a month, or a year, that you are going to come back and be in trouble. Heck, with how easy acceptable gear is to get in FFXIV, you can literally miss an entire expansion and be caught up in usually less than a week. GW2 isn't pushy, but that doesn't mean it can't give you thousands of hours of things to do. With GW2 allowing for the conversion of Gold to Gems, the game might not have the built in gear grind of XIV or WoW, but it certainly has the gear grind of aesthetics. You want a certain outfit, skin, or mount off the shop? No problem. You can farm the gold, buy the gems, and be ready to go when the glorious piece comes back around. Grind for an infusion that makes you look cool. Get the best legendary pieces you want just to say you did it. Complete all the achievements. Complete all the masteries. Collect all the dyes. Play another character to 80. Spend hours getting all the golds on the beetle races (I have a problem). Just because some of us might not want to do any of that (and you really don't have to) doesn't mean that the content itself doesn't exist. And I think that's where a lot of the feeling of lacking comes from. A lot of it is not an actual lacking, but a lacking of what we as individuals might want to see more. The vast majority of MMOs do have extended periods of downtime, because they need to allow for the people that can play the game maybe 3 hours a week to be able to play the game without getting super overwhelmed, as well as give the players that can treat the game like a full time job enough things to do. But, to do the later, that needs to be a lot of different smaller things. I have seen a lot of people complaining that EoD isn't even an expansion, just a LW episode "with fishing". I don't think I have to repeat that fishing actually is exciting to some people. But even if it wasn't, all that we've received was a sneak peek and the understanding we're getting a new specialization for each class and new legendaries. Why anyone thinks that's all they are going to do is beyond me. There is obviously going to be more information released, and not just the mini-hype train of releases for said specializations. We're going to see more maps, more story, and more things to do in those maps. I also wouldn't be surprised if a lot of us don't really take into account the true complexity of a lot of things. Mounts in GW2 are amazingly complex. Their unique movement, their animations, their utility, their character. And that's all before the plethora of skins. FFXIV has a lot of mounts, but really, they are 1 mount with a zillion skins. A lot of the animations are kinda clunky. They all run the same speed, fly the same speed, and swim the same speed. None of them have unique talents outside carrying multiple people (sometimes). And thus all the terrain surrounding mounts in FFXIV can also be treated the same. The attention to detail alone that had to go into going back to Core Tyria and figuring out all the ways you had to basically invisible wall people from going places they shouldn't after allowing mounts and gliding back there would have been intense. Creating maps always considering the modes of travel after the mounts were released is a lot more complicated than "they run on land only until they complete the story and collect all the air currents. Then they fly everywhere." Like, literally. We all fly in FFXIV. Don't have to sustain flight or maintain height. Just straight up fly everywhere. Don't matter if the mount is a giant tortoise or a winged dragon. Will GW2 release a map that requires a griffin or a skyscale even though both a fairly intensive/expensive? Or will they always consider an alternate route that you can manage with Raptor/Springer/Swimmer/Jackal? Likely the latter, which means all maps have to take those 4 into consideration even if the overall intention for the map might be more flying based. So, does GW2 actually have that slow of a release schedule? No. Not based on the type of MMO it is, and how much they allow for players to do other things while also enjoying their game. Based on another current MMO doing well in today's market, they are actually quite similar. Is any of this due to GW2 not having enough money? No. They do plenty well enough with their cash shop method. If they didn't, they wouldn't still be here 9 years later. If the model didn't work 2, 4, 6, 8 years ago they wouldn't keep using it. It's not about the money. It's about the game they want to make based on the staffing they want to have, in conjuncture with predicted profits. If they hired 100 more people onto the GW2 team, paying them even the bare minimum, would the content they produced actually increase player spending? Cause GW2 isn't really about retention. The game is free. You can retain people for free. But are they buying the cash shop items, the expansion, and the LWs? By that same logic, would spending even 100k on advertising bring in enough new people, willing to spend that much money on the game? What is cost effective for them? Hell, that friend I mentioned who loves this game? He took a break, and then talking about MMOs in Discord got him going again. I decided to join in and grabbed the Ultimate pack basically right away. Then we got another person in the Discord into it. Then another, and another. I'm pretty sure we have about 6 people all playing the game now just because of that one player's love of it. Word of mouth is exceptionally powerful. And we gamers are the ones that generally have gamer friends. If we can bring in our gamer friends for free, why would ANet both with advertising? Advertising doesn't inherently mean your get the return you want, or even need. Yes, targeting the right methods and doing the right collabs would probably have some impact. The only question is whether it would be enough to be worth it. And if it's even something they want. Not every game has aspirations to be excessively popular. That might seems unreasonable, but massive booms do often mean unsustainable expansion. Having a solid, healthy player base that is maintained through the content provided by your solid team of developers, without needing to hire and fire people like a kamikaze roller coaster, is way safer and good for everyone in the company for a long term project. And just because the company might receive an increase in players, that doesn't equate to retention or spending. Companies are not going to hire until they have well documented proof of a need. It's much easier to let people go to save money than it is to hire people for a theoretical future profit that might not come. And, finally...any lack of things to do have to be weighed on actual things available versus things of interest. Just because I might not like 40% of the content doesn't mean that content isn't there. And just because I will never do maybe 20% of the available content ever, that doesn't mean it shouldn't exist for those people who highly value it. Objective appraisal of content is likely going to be impossible, for all of us. But it is important to understand that just because we might not value something, someone else out there will. And we should try to be happy for them as well. That doesn't mean we can't voice our dislikes and likes. That is always valuable. But it would be beneficial to see the value and investment in content, even if it is not our own value or investment.

Quite honestly, everything about this topic is just mind blowing. First off, just because you don't like the layout of GW2 doesn't mean other people, even the majority of people also won't like it. I can't even imagine how any of your friends would be at all interested in the game with what I imagine you describe it like. I've played multiple MMOs; UO, FFXI, WoW, and FFXIV. GW2 is my newest one. And I'm still far, far more investing in XIV. But there are a lot of things I like about GW2 and trying to constantly say that a game that's effectively as old as ARR and still has a very healthy population with new expansions still being released is subpar or wrong is laughable. Locking the personal story behind levels: The personal story being locked behind chapters every ten levels is not the way it originally was. Having a friend who's completely invested in this game and has literally been playing since before launch does give me some good insights, even though I've been around less than 3 weeks. But that also gives me a very good view of the game as a complete newb today. So, obviously this choice was made for a reason. And yes, while I do feel like playing the chapters in chunks can potentially prevent attachment to some NPCs, that could also just be me as well. I know from my friend that a lot of people loved a certain charr in the personal story and while I didn't have the pleasure of seeing as much of him, clearly I didn't get attached to my Priory version of that character like others did him. Further to that, personal story feeds into dungeon story as well. You can do your level 30 personal story, then the level 30 story dungeon, and then 3 different paths within that dungeon that give further story and information. Using FFXIV as an example against story locking is also ridiculous. FFXIV is incredibly gatekeepy about their story. You want to experience 1.0? Can't. Blew it up. Want to skip to HW in the free trial since it's included? Nope. Do ARR and nearly 100 bridge quests to get there. Want to unlock Dark Knight when you hit 30, since that's what level it unlocks at? No way, buddy. You have to get into Ishgard for that, and THAT means get to Heavensward. You got hyped for that Shadowbringers expansion and bought the collector's edition right away without having played anything else? Well, hold onto your butts because you gotta do ARR, HW, and SB before you can even touch all that broody darkness. Yes, you level with the story in FFXIV, but you level mainly by doing fetch quests, deliveries, cull quests, and picking up dead bodies. How is it actually different to run around an open work doing events and heart quests in GW2 and doing a main story chunk every 10 levels versus doing fetch quests that have basically no meaning for the majority of the story until it gets to an actual important sub arc. And yes, I have played ARR all the way through 4 entire times before they condensed it. So believe me when I say I understand the leveling process there. Guild Wars 2 also has an extensive focus on exploration. No chocobo at level 20 (or 30+ with how fast we level in XIV). No bee lining it from point A to point B. No stepping one foot into an area and unlocking 25% of the map. There is a strong focus on you as a player exploring the world you are living in. Every race has a quite vast expanse of terrain that is specifically tailored to their culture, history, and region. And the ability to travel from region to region is very quick, upon unlocking Lion's Arch. You don't like the snowy region? Go do Map Completion with the Slyvari. Don't like deserts? Go check out some swamps. Find out why there is a giant purple scar cut through the map. Find out how to help the NPCs harvest some apples, or kill some spiders, or collect rabbit food without getting booted in the behind by an overzealous bunny. How is running around an open world, doing events in the open world, helping NPCs in an organic and living sort of way more of an RPG than being told you are the special and to go do the exact same thing in a completely isolated and solitary sort of way? Oh, I don't know. Because it literally is a better RPG base model. The idea of the role playing game actually vastly depends on the story the developers want to tell. In most Japanese RPGs the majority of the focus is on you playing the role of the character they give you. It's not your character. It's theirs. Think about Link, Cloud, Lightning, and Ash, etc. Those are not our stories. We are just playing their stories. We take on their role. Western RPGs go the other way, more often having a character we customize a lot more, something unique to what we want to do, and sometimes with personality options as well. Think Skyrim, Dragon Age, Mass Effect, Monster Hunter, etc. No, not all games that fall under RPGs match these two categories, but all in all, they are important distinctions. With MMORPGs there is more of a focus on character design because, well, we're playing with thousands of other people and we want our characters to look unique, whether that's making them look like us, or making them look like rainbow flowers, or humanoid snow leopards, or goblin/potatoes. Both FFXIV and GW2 drop you in the middle of the story. The world has been going on before you and will go on after you. GW2 gives you a lot more structure with your character, giving you a racial background, a shared history, and even chosen backgrounds. FFXIV either drops you on a cart/boat with literally no background (that's up to you to figure out for your character), or you are from 1.0 and decided to stick with the option that you were teleported 5 years ahead to the ARR timeline. So... yes. Literally choosing where to go in the open world, engaging in events (same as FATEs), helping heart quest NPCs (same as side or fetch quests), and exploring the area itself via waypoints, points of interest, hero points, and even diving googles is much, much better fodder for character development and role playing over "crystal mommy did a hello. Now you faint at inopportune times and do a smack-a-smack on whatever someone tells you is a baddie". I bought it so I want to play it in the order I want to. Fine?? Do it? Buy a level 80 boost, and do whatever story you want to do in whatever order. Everyone in this thread has outlined how asinine the argument about locking story is. And how ridiculous it is to jump around all over the place. But you wanna do that? Do it. No one is stopping you, or your friends. Yes, you can read the 3rd book in The Lord of the Rings or the 5th book of Harry Potter. And maybe you can even enjoy it. But you will be confused at points. You will have no idea who certain characters are, why they are doing something, where a location is, what the motivation is, who the specific bad guys are, etc. You can still enjoy the book, but parts will not make sense. And if you voluntarily do that you have less than zero grounds to critique anything. That's like people jumping the FFXIV story to Shadowbringers and then literally going around berating the game for having atrocious story telling when they voluntarily skipped about 8 years of said story. While every story should have its own beginning, middle, and end, it is perfectly reasonable and common to have larger arcs, through lines, and reoccurring problems happening over the course of multiple books. Hell, mediocre romance novels can figure this out. It's not high concept. FFXIV has history that stems from 1.0. 2.0, 3.0, 4.0, and 5.0 and are all their own story, but they are also one massive arc that comes to an end in November with 6.0. You can play 5.0 without playing 3.0 or 4.0 but you are also missing so much of import, so many things that are more subtle, more integral to the lore and feel of the world at large. I have zero idea how you can come in here touting the benefits of FFXIV without seeing how many of your complaints run rampant in that game as well. I love FFXIV. I play 2 mains, have more alts than could fit in a grade 5 classroom, and am so obsessed with aspects of the lore that I will literally transcribe the text of the game. You wanna know about Garlemald, I can tell you about Garlemald. But that doesn't mean, at all, that FFXIV doesn't have flaws. And most of them are the exact same ones you claim GW2 to have.