Convinced my friend to buy this, sorely dissapointed

[voltaicbore.8012]

2 hours ago, Swagger.1459 said:

"So long as ANet explained at purchase that LW DLC has story continuation in it"

 

The LW is a continuation of the story. That's pretty clear. 

 

This thread is really about the cost, I'm not concerned with whatever you are trying to spin doctor. Complaining about $100 investment in an almost 10yo game is silly. Some of you just want all the free stuff on top on no sub fee just because it's a "video game" product. Ridiculous to complain about a decade worth of game and content for $100. 

OP's friend who got a refund probably didn't like the price tag, but even people who are okay with the price can take issue with the total lack of sales presentation on LW. We know how LW fits as current players, or people who at least downloaded the full client and read the story journal and saw that there are LW seasons sandwiched between personal story and xpac stories. That's not the problem. It's new purchasers who are getting a nasty surprise.

I'm talking about the purchasing experience on buy.guildwars2.com, the official store. The option to buy the PoF/HoT bundle doesn't mention where LW fits, or even that it exists. Same with EoD, and the "collections" that include EoD + PoF + HoT. When you move to the shopping cart, it shows that others who buy the game have bought LWS2, and you can add that to your cart for $16, but the description doesn't tell you that there are more seasons, or that any of the seasons continue the story.

The only place I can see that ANet tells new purchasers that LW is related to the story is in the dropdown that appears when you mouse over the "Releases" tab on the main page. Living World is the first entry, and it says in small text that LW is "[c]ontent that adds story, rewards, & more to the world of GW2." It's understandable that someone who reads that could think that "adding story" in a DLC could be "side story" rather than "continuing main story", since other large titles often work that way. To make matters worse that page doesn't link you to any way of purchasing the LW episodes, and the only purchasing links are back to PoF/HoT bundles and whatnot - the same pages that don't tell you anything about LW other than the option to buy LWS2. Clicking on each LW entry in the releases page tells you a bit about what's happening, but it's not clear to someone new to GW2 that the stuff happening in there is main story.

So the releases page itself mentions that LW "adds" story, but doesn't make it clear that LW is purchasable DLC separate from the xpacs. The buying page itself doesn't mention LW at all, outside of the option to add LWS2 to your purchase and nothing else. It's just not nearly as clear as it could and should be, from a new consumer standpoint.

Again, this is all coming from a person who thinks the price for LW is fair, and I bought LWS2 at full price (got all the others for free, but I would have paid for them - even IBS - had I not gotten freebies). Even if the price is fair, people should know what their game purchase is getting them, and what it isn't. I don't think ANet is doing a good enough job of that, and it's not because I can't read. It's objectively much less clear than it probably should be.

Edited September 17, 2021 by voltaicbore.8012

[Zoidberg.9237]

7 hours ago, kharmin.7683 said:

If you're willing to pay an increased price for the expansions, then what is your complaint about the current pricing model?

Because I didn't get what I thought I would have gotten. 

[Dante.1508]

On 9/16/2021 at 9:45 AM, Inculpatus cedo.9234 said:

Is it more fair that past players paid, at best, $140 dollars for Core/Hot/PoF, or more, and got the Living World Seasons free?

Or is it more fair that new players pay $30 for Core/HoT/PoF plus ~$50 for Living World Seasons? 

But they got to play them for all those years between. That is where the price difference comes into being..

15 hours ago, kharmin.7683 said:

Who defines properly? 

The people refunding and leaving.

Edited September 17, 2021 by Dante.1508

[Glacial.9516]

I do think that Anet should have an add-on bundle when buying the expansions which contains the Living World chapters (allowing you to choose Season 2, 3, 4, Icebrood Saga individually and together). However this is complicated by the fact that if you already own chapters then you are purchasing things you already have and would need to be refunded gems to compensate. It's less complicated for first-time purchasers, but everyone who buys the expansions is not necessarily new to the game.

I've long felt that the ultimate edition's 4000 gems is the 'Living world bundle' component, but it's probably not at all clear where you should spend those gems especially if you are new (and that 'where should I spend' will be a little different for each person as well).

Edited September 17, 2021 by Glacial.9516

[StrangerDanger.3496]

They really should just package the LW series with the purchase of the expansion content.  Its going to be really rough with the steam community on that topic (steam forums for the game are already a toxic dumpster fire) and TBH it really is off-putting to make a purchase and find out the story content wasn't included.

 

Also, the LW content its mostly just meh....making the purchase feel less...awesome...  I get lore buffs love it and all but I purchased most of it with gems and find it a chore to progress through, though I do enjoy some of the game world built around the LW and their events.

 

Its all poorly explained to the new players, and doesn't make sense to them when properly explained.  Its a source of negativity that doesn't need to exist.  If you want to monetize them, just add a LW battle pass for each LW that people can farm out from playing the content and doing the LW related masteries and world events... and add some additional stuff beyond the box and item that currently exist....even if its like WvW where its mostly boxes full off random items you just send to material deposit.

 

 

Edit: for the confused guy, I'm suggesting they add the LW content to the expansions you buy rather than separate purchases.  The LW monetization is confusing to new people and doesn't make sense as far as normal MMORPG monetization

Edited September 17, 2021 by StrangerDanger.3496
someone was confused

[LucianDK.8615]

Um, Anet have ocassionally sold the dlc bundles at a discount, and price reduced per episode you already own.

[Dean Calaway.9718]

On 9/14/2021 at 9:47 PM, Sicktanick.4369 said:

(...)
Is there something I am missing that makes this more reasonable? Very sad to see that returning players/new players are punished so severely.

The primary reason why Anet charges gems when you miss the Living Story episodes (as they come out they are free if you log in) is to keep the players engaged and coming back, I really don't think it's so much about the money as is so often claimed.

The HUGE downside of this is it does seem like the game is trying to nickle and dime new players, I've said it before and I'll say it again, every expansion bought should include the Living Story that came before it, or immediately after, as per the color scheme.
Either way, anyone buying EoD+PoF+HoT should get all the Living Story episodes thrown in for free, that would make this game incredible good value plus they can keep the whole "if you don't log in, is 200 gems later" going on, but don't ask them for more money if they just spent 50 EUR/USD on all expansions.

And because I know someone will say this... no, having them all coming out now for free doesn't count, because, when EoD releases that will have media attention, and streamers, a lot of people might be interested then in February, it won't do them any good if you tell them "well, at the end of last year when you didn't even know this latest expansion was a thing we were giving these episodes away for free, sorry you missed them..."

[voltaicbore.8012]

5 hours ago, Glacial.9516 said:

However this is complicated by the fact that if you already own chapters then you are purchasing things you already have and would need to be refunded gems to compensate. It's less complicated for first-time purchasers, but everyone who buys the expansions is not necessarily new to the game.

This is true. I would argue that anyone who's played the game to any appreciable extent probably should be held accountable for having at least looked at the story journal tab once, and seen that there's a bunch of LW entries in there that appear in order of where they fit into the story. I haven't attempted this myself, but since you have to use your ANet login to make a purchase, it would be nice if the system recognized what content you have unlocked, and would tell players to remove the LW purchase from the shopping cart if they already have it.

The totally new players looking to buy into the game for the first time, well, they're not getting any of this information at all.

3 minutes ago, Dean Calaway.9718 said:

The primary reason why Anet charges gems when you miss the Living Story episodes (as they come out they are free if you log in) is to keep the players engaged and coming back, I really don't think it's so much about the money as is so often claimed.

I also suspect LW chapter unlocks are not a big moneymaker, based solely on the fact that they give them away for free on such a large scale. LW unlocks are not like transmutes or other consumables ANet gives for free in various ways - once you have the unlock, there's no way for ANet to monetize that from you again.

[Dean Calaway.9718]

1 minute ago, voltaicbore.8012 said:

I also suspect LW chapter unlocks are not a big moneymaker, based solely on the fact that they give them away for free on such a large scale. LW unlocks are not like transmutes or other consumables ANet gives for free in various ways - once you have the unlock, there's no way for ANet to monetize that from you again.

Yes, that was exactly my point, if it was about the money they wouldn't be free when they originally come out, and they wouldn't be giving them away again right now, that is why I've always believed it's just about keeping players coming back, same thing with the daily log in rewards, "just get in game every day and here's something, by the way, look at these dailies you could be doing to get even more rewards."

Let's face it, these episodes, specially the ones that introduce new maps, would be sold in any other game, not given away for free. They really only need to bundle these with the expansions when you buy those, imagine all that content for 50 bucks, instead like OP mentioned it's north of 100 bucks to get all that right now.

[voltaicbore.8012]

4 minutes ago, Dean Calaway.9718 said:

Let's face it, these episodes, specially the ones that introduce new maps, would be sold in any other game, not given away for free. They really only need to bundle these with the expansions when you buy those, imagine all that content for 50 bucks, instead like OP mentioned it's north of 100 bucks to get all that right now.

Exactly - that's why I've been saying the price itself for LW seems fair. Any other game would be selling that kind of content, not giving it to so many of us for free. It seems counter-intuitive for me to also agree that it's probably a decent idea for ANet to start including it for free in xpac sales, but I do agree with the idea since the point of LW doesn't seem to be money anyways.

Whether or not LW should be bundled for free in xpac sales, at the very least it seems pretty clear that ANet might want to consider clarifying what LW is and where it fits at the point of sale.

[Epsilon Indi.2031]

On 9/14/2021 at 10:14 PM, Touchme.1097 said:

If your friend wanted to play FF14 for one year it would cost him14.99 dollars a month or 179.88 dollars a year.

If your friend wanted to play NW it would cost him 40 dollars for the standard edition compared to PoF+HoT+Standard Gw2 game which is periodically on offer at 50% discount, and you also have to take into account that you will have to pay for NW expansions in the future and the game has less content than GW2 being new.

It looks to me that your friend had no reasons to think that paying for GW2 was a bad deal, because if he bought the Ultimate edition of PoF using the 4000 gems to get his living world season content and preordering the standard edition of EoD he would have spent much less than the other competitors in the market. He missed a chance to join millions of players and buying a product with a huge amount of content to play. His loss.

 

You don't have to feel regrets for your friend, it was his choice, not yours.

$80 (rounding up) base cost for Ultimate EoD.
$25 of those are just 4k gems; $55 for the expansion.

4,160 gems to get all LW stories. 

No, I'm not going to factor in the free re-releases going on now.  This is the average cost of getting into GW2 as-is with no deals.

The game costs $82 upfront to have access to everything (4160 gems = +$2 over the gems you get preordering)

When you buy the game, it says you get access to the LW episodes.  What this means to ANet is that you get access to playing any you have unlocked, but not actually opening them up.  What players read this as, though, is completely different.  They assume, going in (Because, let's be real, it's not clear on the website) that they (the player) gets all this content for  $80 and access to the living world episodes.

This becomes even more true.  No matter what you do as a new player just getting into GW2 and, unless there's some special event going on, you'll have to front $50 for the LW episodes as they cost ~$50 all together.  Buying just PoF and HoT is ~$30 most days, so this comes out to the same cost as EoD ultimate edition.

[Swagger.1459]

20 hours ago, voltaicbore.8012 said:

Exactly - that's why I've been saying the price itself for LW seems fair. Any other game would be selling that kind of content, not giving it to so many of us for free. It seems counter-intuitive for me to also agree that it's probably a decent idea for ANet to start including it for free in xpac sales, but I do agree with the idea since the point of LW doesn't seem to be money anyways.

Whether or not LW should be bundled for free in xpac sales, at the very least it seems pretty clear that ANet might want to consider clarifying what LW is and where it fits at the point of sale.

Free doesn’t pay the bills or future development.
 

You gave away free living world in an xpac they lose money.

 

You add in the price of the living world and the cost of the game and Xpacs and the price goes up.

 

You itemize the game, Xpacs, living world makes purchases more of an option.

 

Anet doesn’t charge a sub fee, they can’t survive by doing things for free. 
 

The cost of almost a decades worth of game and lw is not problematic. The problem is all the people who want everything for free from this company, just because the product is a video game.

 

You don’t walk into the local market or store and expect free stuff, but some people expect and want all this free online stuff.

 

Anet is a business. And a very generous one at that. Zero monthly sub. Buy anything from gemstore for free by exchanging gold… Yet, still in 2021, people spend money left and right, and money of frivolous things and nonessentials, but they want free this and free that…

You should educate yourself on the costs of running a business and having hundreds of employees, maybe you’ll get a different perspective. 

 

[voltaicbore.8012]

7 minutes ago, Swagger.1459 said:

You should educate yourself on the costs of running a business and having hundreds of employees, maybe you’ll get a different perspective. 

 

 For whatever reason, you keep seeing this as purely a price discussion. I'll say it again: I think the price is fair, and while it might make business sense to include it for free in xpacs, that is not at all necessary. Any other studio would always charge and never give away something like LW, thus I think paying for LW is understandable and fair.

For the third time, this is not about price. The problem is that new customers are not being told enough about where LW fits into their purchase of the game, and ANet should do something about that.

The smartest "something" here would just be making more of the LW seasons (not just S2) more easily purchaseable on the official store, along with some kind of message on the Releases page (not just the small text in the dropdown) that makes it clear that there is main story progression inside LW. Another "something" ANet could do is just start including LW for free in xpac sales, but that is not necessary and may cause some avoidable losses on ANet's end.

Also, for all your talk on the costs of business, you seem to have no concept of what a "loss leader" is - do yourself a favor and look it up. Not every product succeeds by earning a profit on its sale. I'm not saying LW is (or should be) a loss leader - honestly the core game being free-to-play is a huge enough loss leader already - but the value of LW to ANet might very well be something other than the purchase price.

[Xanadrine.4352]

I started in 2018 around july, i missed the previous LWS and when i quit about 5 moths later i missed the ones that came after. It was a blessing when I came back this year and they rereleased them all so i could get them. But new players or old ones coming back to EoD wont get that. What i think should happen with the release of the new expansion is, for a limited time when you purchase Eod you get all the LWS up to that point included, make sure and say that on the details of the expansion so people know, this can run for a couple of months and it will go a long way to player retention, and less anger from players that had no idea the LWS were sold separately. 

[Gehenna.3625]

1 hour ago, Zuldari.3940 said:

and less anger from players that had no idea the LWS were sold separately. 

not just sold separately...the mere fact that they exist is a surprise to many.

[Swagger.1459]

On 9/17/2021 at 2:40 PM, voltaicbore.8012 said:

It seems counter-intuitive for me to also agree that it's probably a decent idea for ANet to start including it for free in xpac sales

……… 

 

So you don’t keep wondering why I made that post. 
 

I know, you think it’s ok for Anet to give away more free stuff, on top of no sub fee, so what else should Anet give away for free out of the kindness of their hearts? 

[Epsilon Indi.2031]

3 hours ago, Swagger.1459 said:

……… 

 

So you don’t keep wondering why I made that post. 
 

I know, you think it’s ok for Anet to give away more free stuff, on top of no sub fee, so what else should Anet give away for free out of the kindness of their hearts? 

ANet makes more money on key & skin (Mount, outfit, individual pieces) sales than they ever do on LW chapters.  Why else would they (ANet) be giving them away for free the last few months?

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

I think, mainly for something for us, new and old, to do whilst Living World (and everything else) is on hold (while they finish End of Dragons). 

[Maikimaik.1974]

On 9/16/2021 at 5:27 AM, Sicktanick.4369 said:

Again, for people that keep skimming posts, the cost may be fair, but that is not the point. Also can we get a check on "1000s of hours of content for only another 50 bucks"...it is not 1000 hours of content, lets be real. 

I'm approaching 2500 hours played and there's still content that I've never even seen before.

[voltaicbore.8012]

2 hours ago, Sir Alymer.3406 said:

ANet makes more money on key & skin (Mount, outfit, individual pieces) sales than they ever do on LW chapters.  Why else would they (ANet) be giving them away for free the last few months?

He just doesn't get it. The quote he cherry picked from me is also separated from all the other times where I said the LW-included-for-free idea isn't necessary or even the main point of all the complaints. He just thinks everyone wants LW for free, seems all he's capable of processing. Not worth engaging anymore, really.

[voltaicbore.8012]

5 hours ago, Swagger.1459 said:

I know, you think it’s ok for Anet to give away more free stuff, on top of no sub fee, so what else should Anet give away for free out of the kindness of their hearts? 

Nothing. Learn some business, bro.

[Epsilon Indi.2031]

1 hour ago, Inculpatus cedo.9234 said:

I think, mainly for something for us, new and old, to do whilst Living World (and everything else) is on hold (while they finish End of Dragons). 

This is the second time they've re-released a living world in episodes.  The first t ime was before alll-or-nothing with dragonfall that included rereleases of all  of  season 4 leading up to the final chapter.

[Swagger.1459]

36 minutes ago, voltaicbore.8012 said:

He just doesn't get it. The quote he cherry picked from me is also separated from all the other times where I said the LW-included-for-free idea isn't necessary or even the main point of all the complaints. He just thinks everyone wants LW for free, seems all he's capable of processing. Not worth engaging anymore, really.

I’m allowed to comment on comments you make, and that’s the comment I chose to comment on to make a point. If you don’t want someone to comment on your comment, then avoid making those comments, and certainly don’t accuse someone of “cherry picking”. 
 

Spend some time thinking about stuff, and less time spin doctoring. 

[voltaicbore.8012]

13 hours ago, Swagger.1459 said:

I’m allowed to comment on comments you make, and that’s the comment I chose to comment on to make a point. If you don’t want someone to comment on your comment, then avoid making those comments, and certainly don’t accuse someone of “cherry picking”. 
 

Spend some time thinking about stuff, and less time spin doctoring. 

Spend some time getting comprehension. I've thought plenty, and laid out those thoughts pretty clearly.

 

I never said or implied you weren't allowed to comment on my (or anyone else's) comments. I simply judged your responses as inferior and unhelpful, as you remain convinced that the only problem with the LW situation is that people don't want to pay for it. You have nothing useful to add about the overall way LW is designed and sold, so you just wait until you can shake your fist and say "duurrrr game dev can't happen for free!" You're allowed to say that, and I'm allowed to say that your comments are terrible.

[Atheismo.5164]

On 9/14/2021 at 2:53 PM, Just a flesh wound.3589 said:

If he does the daily each day he can buy one LS episode about every 2 months

Imagine thinking this is an good argument in favor of the system.