Anet, can we get better promotion for the game?

[Kuya.6495]

I try to get my friends interested in trying the game, but there is really nothing i can use to show them how fun it can be because all the trailers are so vague or so in-lore that only someone who is already a fan would care.  For example, i play ffxiv, but i still play guild wars 2 because i prefer the pvp here, and more generally, i like the combat system better in this game, but you don't seem to make a lot of trailers showcasing how awesome and fun the game can be in combat. Why not do more trailers using combat?  There are some cool moves you can do, especially in pvp, that, with the right lighting and camera angles, would look amazing. You can use this to promote the expansion too.  For example, back in beta 1, despite willbender's problems, i enjoyed using judge's intervention and heaven's palm, and i think if you present that right, you could make it look interesting for someone who isn't familiar with gw2. 

 

I'm not going to dive into the spoilers aspect, because there's already a thread covering it, but i think in general, GW2 is a solid game, but the promotion and hype building for it is almost non-existent. The hype building isn't just for game veterans, it's also for attracting new customers. I get that after HoT, Anet might be cautious of over promising, but maybe it just means you need a different approach to hype building.  Instead of building hype with promises, try to build hype with well composed trailers, particularly combat trailers if you're so against using story details. And by combat trailers, i don't just mean close ups of skill animations. I mean a peak at what high level gameplay can look up from interesting angles. 

 

Anyway, please promote the game better. The game deserves more players and more players would raise not only your profits but it would also make the game better for everyone (shorter queues, funner WvW, more people to play with in PVE). 

 

edit: as an example, the best trailers Anet did were for the living world seasons 3 and 4 episodes. Those are great! Great camera angles, and great music. Please do something similar with the game's combat and mechanics. Good music, well timed skills, and people chaining their skills in interesting ways (ex: phrase transversal to unrelenting assault to surge of the mists, judge's intervention to whirling wrath, symbol of blades to test of faith to spear of justice to shield of absorption to hunter's verdict, and holo leap to holographic shockwave, etc).

Edited December 8, 2021 by Kuya.6495

[Mungo Zen.9364]

I don’t disagree with the sentiment, as more is more, but Anet does support content creators of all types who do provide a wide variety of videos and guides that help promote the game. 
 

While we usually see a streamer giving away gems or community chests to hype their channels, they get these from Anet as a partner to hype things like the Bwta events we just had. Or new user guides, game mode specific guides and all manner of fan content. 
 

I started playing the game because of Dulfy, like many others I assume. The Mighty Teapots, Mukluks and Ayin Maidens and many more are out there hyping this game daily with content about GW2. 
 

Maybe that would be a good way for you to share GW2 with your friends. By showing them what other people get hyped about in this game, not what the developers think are the highlights. 
 

Edit:

I am aware of how many times I used the word hype

Edited December 8, 2021 by Mungo Zen.9364
Hype

[Artemis.8034]

They really need to advertise this game, esp if they have and expansion coming out. i never even heard of this game till recently when a friend quit another game we played and came here. People dont know about it , ramp up the promotion of the expansion this is the perfect time to do it around the holidays.

[Omega.6801]

The game is free to play and if you and your friends are into PvP, you can show them without them having to gear or level anything I suppose. (Not sure how f2p and PvP interact tbh).

But yes, advertisment has always been a bit lackluster to say the least.

[Dayra.7405]

2 hours ago, Kuya.6495 said:

Anyway, please promote the game better. The game deserves more players and more players would raise not only your profits but it would also make the game better for everyone (shorter queues, funner WvW, more people to play with in PVE). 

Tell all your gamer friends that GW2 is the best MMO to play, that's the best promotion 😉

[Tachenon.5270]

Imagine GW2 having a Netflix series along the lines of Arcane.

[witcher.3197]

1 hour ago, Tachenon.5270 said:

Imagine GW2 having a Netflix series along the lines of Arcane.

That'd require Anet to be interested in their own world.

And with the current writers.. we're trying to bring people in, not drive them away.

[Faridah.8431]

3 hours ago, Artemis.8034 said:

They really need to advertise this game, esp if they have and expansion coming out. i never even heard of this game till recently when a friend quit another game we played and came here. People dont know about it , ramp up the promotion of the expansion this is the perfect time to do it around the holidays.

I'm not sure ANET knows how to advertise it to new people. Anyone remember the live action trailer leading to Core launch? Most of the trailers since have needed knowledge of what's going on as they've been more directed towards existing player bases.

Looking back, as an example, new player doesn't know or care who Balthazar is, maybe is interested in mounts but doesn't understand what's new about GW2 mounts. At best understands there's a story where its us vs Balthazar and it's in a desert environment. Nothing else from the game really advertised there.

 

[Monarc.9726]

On 12/8/2021 at 4:54 PM, Tachenon.5270 said:

Imagine GW2 having a Netflix series along the lines of Arcane.

That would certainly be cool. Easier said than done, but maybe if the right animation studio was interested…

[voltaicbore.8012]

On 12/8/2021 at 5:08 PM, witcher.3197 said:

That'd require Anet to be interested in their own world.

This is actually a much bigger problem than most people might realize.

 

I really regret losing the link to it, but a longtime, veteran writer for this game once specifically stated that ANet's narrative team does not care about world building. That person left some time ago, but this legacy of absolutely failing at narrative cohesion has left a strong mark on the game, in my opinion. At least the current version of the narrative team seems more content to not uselessly reinvent the wheel at a whim.

Also, I'm certain that the Netflix show exists because League already has a huge audience. Sure, ANet could miraculously make a decent show, advertise it effectively, and get it in front of tons people who don't already know the game (and are so charmed by Tyria that they download the game and buy all 3 xpacs). But if that sounds like a very long shot, it's because it is - it's more likely to just be a waste of energy and money.

[Norbe.7630]

You can show my videos to your friend who likes PvP combat stuff. I dunno anyone else makes slow motion music videos on WvW combat aside from me.

I create videos to promote the game to other non gw2 players specially to my former guildmates from other mmo.

They are playing ff14, we had the same problem in what to show our friends about the game. I made a temporary solution by creating videos myself.

But this EoD thing, I wanna hide it from friends cause of shame. Maybe join them in ff14 instead.

Edited December 10, 2021 by Norbe.7630

[witcher.3197]

13 hours ago, voltaicbore.8012 said:

This is actually a much bigger problem than most people might realize.

 

I really regret losing the link to it, but a longtime, veteran writer for this game once specifically stated that ANet's narrative team does not care about world building. That person left some time ago, but this legacy of absolutely failing at narrative cohesion has left a strong mark on the game, in my opinion. At least the current version of the narrative team seems more content to not uselessly reinvent the wheel at a whim.

Also, I'm certain that the Netflix show exists because League already has a huge audience. Sure, ANet could miraculously make a decent show, advertise it effectively, and get it in front of tons people who don't already know the game (and are so charmed by Tyria that they download the game and buy all 3 xpacs). But if that sounds like a very long shot, it's because it is - it's more likely to just be a waste of energy and money.

Anet probably blew their chance at getting people invested in the story when they decided on the 250 year gap and multiple playable races.

Much of the GW1 community was invested in the world, and Anet threw it all out of the window because they had to remake the world to show the passage of time and also had to retcon the entire history of the world to be less human centric. They alienated their old playerbase and failed to capture the same level of interest from new players.

Recently there was a poll on the GW1 subreddit where the top 2 community favorite zones of all time were Shing Jea and Pre-searing, 2 starter zones. I highly doubt that GW2 players feel any sort of strong attachment to any of the starter zones. GW1 did a good job hooking people with the very first zones while in GW2 it's just another generic zone with a few events here and there. The world building and immersion was just way stronger in GW1.

We won't get our Arcane because Anet managed to cut too many threads of emotional attachment people had for GW and replaced it with some generic dragon of the year adventure.

Edited December 10, 2021 by witcher.3197

[Linken.6345]

12 minutes ago, witcher.3197 said:

Anet probably blew their chance at getting people invested in the story when they decided on the 250 year gap and multiple playable races.

Much of the GW1 community was invested in the world, and Anet threw it all out of the window because they had to remake the world to show the passage of time and also had to retcon the entire history of the world to be less human centric. They alienated their old playerbase and failed to capture the same level of interest from new players.

Recently there was a poll on the GW1 subreddit where the top 2 community favorite zones of all time were Shing Jea and Pre-searing, 2 starter zones. I highly doubt that GW2 players feel any sort of strong attachment to any of the starter zones. GW1 did a good job hooking people with the very first zones while in GW2 it's just another generic zone with a few events here and there. The world building and immersion was just way stronger in GW1.

We won't get our Arcane because Anet managed to cut too many threads of emotional attachment people had for GW and replaced it with some generic dragon of the year adventure.

Aint gw2 more successful then gw1?

So they got enough of the gw1 vets and a bunch more from other places.

[witcher.3197]

7 minutes ago, Linken.6345 said:

Aint gw2 more successful then gw1?

So they got enough of the gw1 vets and a bunch more from other places.

More successful by what metric? Besides, gemstore sales doing okay isn't the same as people being invested in the lore.

[Linken.6345]

1 hour ago, witcher.3197 said:

More successful by what metric? Besides, gemstore sales doing okay isn't the same as people being invested in the lore.

is there anything but generating money share holders care about?

 

[Tachenon.5270]

3 hours ago, witcher.3197 said:

GW1 did a good job hooking people with the very first zones while in GW2 it's just another generic zone with a few events here and there.

True, but I also think the GW2 starter zones suffered tremendously with the infliction, I mean, implementation of the New Player Experience. Dancing for cows, and all that. Dancing for cows! Then again, pondering the intense evaluation of -- what, metrics? -- that must have led to that decision has given me much entertainment over the years, so. /e shrug

Meanwhile, down Memory Lane...

 

 

[Faridah.8431]

4 hours ago, witcher.3197 said:

Anet probably blew their chance at getting people invested in the story when they decided on the 250 year gap and multiple playable races.

Much of the GW1 community was invested in the world, and Anet threw it all out of the window because they had to remake the world to show the passage of time and also had to retcon the entire history of the world to be less human centric. They alienated their old playerbase and failed to capture the same level of interest from new players.

Recently there was a poll on the GW1 subreddit where the top 2 community favorite zones of all time were Shing Jea and Pre-searing, 2 starter zones. I highly doubt that GW2 players feel any sort of strong attachment to any of the starter zones. GW1 did a good job hooking people with the very first zones while in GW2 it's just another generic zone with a few events here and there. The world building and immersion was just way stronger in GW1.

We won't get our Arcane because Anet managed to cut too many threads of emotional attachment people had for GW and replaced it with some generic dragon of the year adventure.

While I agree to the notion that they completely alienated a good portion of the GW1 player base that was at all invested into the world building and lore aspects of the franchise, for better or for worse depending on your perspective on that matter, GW2 has clearly reached a wider audience than GW1 did and from a purely business standpoint all ANET really needs to care about.

As a GW1 veteran, the 250 year gap and what I thought were a lot of bad narrative decisions with some of the initial GW2 world building and some of the storylines we got down the road (Lazarus in S3 for example) has always left a bad taste in my mouth. At this point I mostly enjoy GW2 for the gameplay then the story, though I still like exploring and experiencing the story good or bad. I guess I just see it as two distinct games and frankly two distinct worlds at this stage of which I enjoy both for differing reasons. I think a lot of us GW1 vets feel a bit spurned by how GW2 ended up going as a "sequel" as it never really became a spiritual successor to GW1, and was more a completely different game in the same franchise. At the time, and I guess it's still true now, GW is the only franchise/world ANET has. Part of me wonders sometimes if GW2 would have been better as a new MMO unrelated to the GW IP at all. You wouldn't be having to try to keep narrative cohesion to what came before or else failing to do so and angering those fans, plus you are not locked into other things people have complained about like rehashing GW1 locations/story threads, or else having a Dragons story that overstayed its welcome to clearly both the player base and ANET themselves.

I digress. As a GW1 vet, GW2 has always been a disappointment for me. As a GW2 player not thinking about GW1, it's a fun game in and of itself and I can like both games for differing reasons.

tl;dr: GW2 has always had a marketing problem - it lacks good cohesion to GW1 which angered the GW1 vets while simultaneously spending much of the past 9 1/2 years since launch revisiting story threads and locations from GW1, yet it also lacks a clear promotion/marketing direction towards new players.

Edited December 10, 2021 by Faridah.8431

[voltaicbore.8012]

2 hours ago, Faridah.8431 said:

Part of me wonders sometimes if GW2 would have been better as a new MMO unrelated to the GW IP at all. You wouldn't be having to try to keep narrative cohesion to what came before or else failing to do so and angering those fans, plus you are not locked into other things people have complained about like rehashing GW1 locations/story threads, or else having a Dragons story that overstayed its welcome to clearly both the player base and ANET themselves.

I think about this too. Given how things have turned out (a ton of GW1 vets feel GW2 is just an entirely different game/world, GW1 story threads have been some what unmasterfully handled in GW2, etc) I feel like ANet really could have avoided baggage and just made a different game world.

 

That said, I also understand how hard it is to convince people to get on board with a big change in direction, so the safety of using a familiar name and setting would be look (and in most cases, actually is) easier to sell to both consumers and corporate overlords. So I don't think ANet necessarily made a mistake in keeping the same name and setting, but if they were going to basically abandon seamless continuity anyways, the end result is the worst of both worlds: the longtime franchise devotees don't like the sequel, and new people can't get more depth out of the sequel because its connection to the predecessor is weak.

[Faridah.8431]

38 minutes ago, voltaicbore.8012 said:

I think about this too. Given how things have turned out (a ton of GW1 vets feel GW2 is just an entirely different game/world, GW1 story threads have been some what unmasterfully handled in GW2, etc) I feel like ANet really could have avoided baggage and just made a different game world.

 

That said, I also understand how hard it is to convince people to get on board with a big change in direction, so the safety of using a familiar name and setting would be look (and in most cases, actually is) easier to sell to both consumers and corporate overlords. So I don't think ANet necessarily made a mistake in keeping the same name and setting, but if they were going to basically abandon seamless continuity anyways, the end result is the worst of both worlds: the longtime franchise devotees don't like the sequel, and new people can't get more depth out of the sequel because its connection to the predecessor is weak.

Yep, this is pretty much my thought on it.

[TheHeavyHat.2936]

I've tried to promote guild wars on my YouTube channel "the heavy hat."  I've actually gotten several real life friends playing from it.  I eventually got turned down for the arenanet partner program unfortunately, but this game still definitely needs more promotion. I agree.

[voltaicbore.8012]

On 12/12/2021 at 9:42 PM, KniffGrant.2519 said:

I've tried to promote guild wars on my YouTube channel "the heavy hat."  I've actually gotten several real life friends playing from it.  I eventually got turned down for the arenanet partner program unfortunately, but this game still definitely needs more promotion. I agree.

Oh hey, I sub/follow your channel!

But yeah you know better than most: the audience for GW2 is relatively small, and ANet seems satisfied with leaning on smaller creators like you to keep the game in front of eyeballs. 

I have no clue what it takes/what goes into getting partnered, but if you still want it, I hope it happens for you someday.

[Kuya.6495]

By the way, today's trailer is exactly what i wanted. Good job and thank you!  Please do more like this!