Oh Gods! "Blade Runner" Kaineng City is real :(

[Sobx.1758]

12 hours ago, witcher.3197 said:

Many people here are saying this is how it's always been in GW2, but it's worth mentioning how the franchise started with Pre-Searing Ascalon, not GW2. What we have now is almost a completely different universe, so I don't think it's unreasonable for people to complain about the massive shift in direction and tone.

Many people here are saying that, because it's a relevant response to the complaint which was set on pretending "this is not what gw2 is". Now you're reverting to "this is not gw2, this is THE FRANCHISE!" possibly because you start understanding the complaint about "gw2 not really being what it was" wasn't exactly correct.

12 hours ago, witcher.3197 said:

I for one liked the setting of GW1 a lot.

Great, but this is gw2 and it was gw2 since the release.

Edited December 22, 2021 by Sobx.1758

[Ashantara.8731]

1 hour ago, witcher.3197 said:

Yes, but in a way that fit into the world. I talked about how advancements can happen without issue as long as it's within the scope of the original vision. I think GW1 asura still fit into that. Their gimmick was imbuing stone constructs with magic, bringing them to life which isn't all that different to what a necromancer does, they were like the other side of the same coin. I could buy into the magic part.

Oola actually did mention (as do her holographic projections in GW2) that she used Necromancy to bring her golems to life.

1 hour ago, witcher.3197 said:

What also served to balance them out was their architecture which was arguably more primitive than that of humans, and blended really well into nature. Some of their labs were just caverns and their towns were very far from urban. They had things they were technologically superior at, and things they were weaker at. GW2 asura is just straight up a sci-fi civilization and I'm not buying that any magic is involved. It's not magitech, just tech. Same goes for Cantha, are the writers going to tell me it's a "magic microwave"? Cmon, I know what a microwave is and it for sure isn't magic..

In GW2, Anet is just using "magic" as a synonym for electricity. Sure, you could argue both are energy, but I think how they're used is what distinguishes the two, and there is nothing "magical" about the way GW2 handles magitech.

Yes, the whole concept of ley-lines is nothing but electricity indeed (Rata Novus is ridiculous that way - like an easter egg that's meant as a homage to BioShock). The extent of their tech simply doesn't fit into Tyria's beautiful environment and original concept (the glee I felt when I created my first characters and explored the high-fantasy beauty of Divinity's Reach).

Hey, perhaps that's why Cantha's jade-tech is presented in such an ugly, toxic neon green: to symbolize how tech is poisonous to the world. 👍 Let's go grab our warhammers (of which we will see many more now with some of the new elite specs) and smash those abominations into pieces! ☠️ "Eat this, microwave!" 🤬

Edited December 22, 2021 by Ashantara.8731

[witcher.3197]

1 hour ago, Sobx.1758 said:

Many people here are saying that, because it's a relevant response to the complaint which was set on pretending "this is not what gw2 is". Now you're reverting to "this is not gw2, this is THE FRANCHISE!" possibly because you start understanding the complaint about "gw2 not really being what it was" wasn't exactly correct.

Great, but this is gw2 and it was gw2 since the release.

No, I still think they are taking it too far even for GW2.

I'm just also trying to point out how changing so much of what GW was for GW2 was a fatal mistake for this franchise. World building is incredibly important for MMOs, and most big MMOs are based on already established and popular game universes.

It's a miracle that GW1 even took off without any brand recognition, and Anet did some really solid world building in just 3 years.

Then GW2 came along and instead of trying to strengthen the identity of the franchise they decided to dumpster the GW1 world and lore. Brilliant decision, truly. Way to shoot themselves in the foot. Instead of building on their previous playerbase, they found so many ways to alienate them it's crazy.

We wouldn't be discussing what's GW and what isn't GW if GW2 didn't insist on redefining it and alienating the veteran playerbase.

Anet made a mistake in 2012, now they are making the same mistake in 2022, except not only are they reimagining what's arguably the most popular part of GW1, what they are doing is pushing it even for GW2. That's my problem. And it doesn't even make narrative sense to top it all off..

Edited December 22, 2021 by witcher.3197

[Sobx.1758]

10 minutes ago, witcher.3197 said:

No, I still think they are taking it too far even for GW2.

Ok. I don't, since we had screens and holograms since the beginning in gw2 and I like where they're going with it.

10 minutes ago, witcher.3197 said:

GW2 was a fatal mistake for this franchise

I fail to see how it was/is a "fatal mistake". I'd be more inclined to make the opposite claim, but in the end I can't really be sure.

Edited December 22, 2021 by Sobx.1758

[witcher.3197]

2 hours ago, Sobx.1758 said:

I fail to see how it was/is a "fatal mistake". I'd be more inclined to make the opposite claim, but in the end I can't really be sure.

Because the way I see it people are less invested in the world of Tyria than they were a decade ago. Or rather they are still invested in GW1, but not in the GW2 story. That's why here we are, 10 years after launch, still digging up GW1 locations to butcher for profit. GW2 tried to be its own thing and failed, Anet is forced to cater to the GW1 crowd, but the devs are just as uninterested in doing that as they were 10 years ago. The result: we get to go to Cantha, because the name sells, but what we get won't be Cantha.

[Sajuuk Khar.1509]

35 minutes ago, witcher.3197 said:

Because the way I see it people are less invested in the world of Tyria than they were a decade ago. Or rather they are still invested in GW1, but not in the GW2 story. That's why here we are, 10 years after launch, still digging up GW1 locations to butcher for profit. GW2 tried to be its own thing and failed, Anet is forced to cater to the GW1 crowd, but the devs are just as uninterested in doing that as they were 10 years ago. The result: we get to go to Cantha, because the name sells, but what we get won't be Cantha.

Well no, we're going to Cantha because thats how franchises work.

You don't make up a huge fantasy world like Guild Wars' in the first game... only to them immediately go somewhere else and ignore it exists in the 2nd one. Its like asking for an Elder Scrolls game, but then saying you don't want it set on Tamriel, and don't want to include pretty much anything from Tamriel... well thats not really an Elder Scrolls game now is it?

This is especially valid because the Guild Wars world already covers pretty much every major biome, and most major regions of the world. Tyria is !Europe, and !Middle East, Elona is !Africa, and Cantha is !Asia. Everyting from dense jungles, to clustered forests, sweeping deserts, high mountains, and fertile grasslands, already exists in Guild Wars' universe. Why would you add a 2nd copy of that thing when the first thing already exists?

The only thing GW2 doesn't have is a !Americas region, but Anet has already suggested such a place exists. We have seen such a place in Utopia concept art, and we know theres another human land on the "wetlands" continent. I bet if we go anywhere big after EoD its there to round out Tyria's world with one last major region.

Edited December 22, 2021 by Sajuuk Khar.1509

[witcher.3197]

2 hours ago, Sajuuk Khar.1509 said:

Well no, we're going to Cantha because thats how franchises work.

And other hilarious things you can tell yourself.

We are going to Cantha because Anet screwed up hard and needs to show results to NCSoft and Cantha is their "break in case of emergency" box as they know how popular it is. If all they needed was an expansion, any expansion, they could've cut the IBS in half before Primordus comes in and give us a Destroyer expansion that properly finishes off the Primordus/Jormag stuff. Instead they butchered IBS and are scrambling to take us to the one place in GW1 they haven't milked dry yet.

"We must go to all GW1 zones before new stuff" doesn't hold up because literally the first new zone ever added to GW2 after lauch was Southsun Cove, a zone we have never even heard of before in the lore. The biome logic doesn't hold up either, GW2 has already covered just about everything. Besides there's no rule that say every civilization and region ever to exist on Earth must be represented in Tyria.

[Sajuuk Khar.1509]

8 minutes ago, witcher.3197 said:

We are going to Cantha because Anet screwed up hard and needs to show results to NCSoft and Cantha is their "break in case of emergency" box as they know how popular it is. If all they needed was an expansion, any expansion, they could've cut the IBS in half before Primordus comes in and give us a Destroyer expansion that properly finishes off the Primordus/Jormag stuff. Instead they butchered IBS and are scrambling to take us to the one place in GW1 they haven't milked dry yet.

There would have never been a Destroyer expansion because most of the Destroyer stuff was finished before IBS even began. There isn't enough there to support a full expansion. The Asura plot was done back starting in HoT, and in LWS3, and the Dwarven stuff was pretty much concluded with the Thunderhead Peaks release back in LWS4. IBS finished off the last bit of it with Steel and Fire, which showed us what happened to the Stone Summit, but that was pretty much all that was left to do there.

8 minutes ago, witcher.3197 said:

"We must go to all GW1 zones before new stuff" doesn't hold up because literally the first new zone ever added to GW2 after lauch was Southsun Cove, a zone we have never even heard of before in the lore. The biome logic doesn't hold up either, GW2 has already covered just about everything. Besides there's no rule that say every civilization and region ever to exist on Earth must be represented in Tyria.

Well this wasn't the argument made.

A. Southsun is still part of Kryta, and the area around it, which was featured in GW1. It isn't some totally new land off in the middle of nowhere.

B I never said every biome or civilization had to be represented in Tyira, I said Tyria covers most as is, and thus there is little reason to go elsewhere when said thing already exists.

Now you're arguing things no one said.

Edited December 22, 2021 by Sajuuk Khar.1509

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

Funny...'facts' have always been found on the forums that the reason we didn't have anything Cantha-related was because NCSoft forbade it.  Now, 'facts' are we have Cantha because NCSoft finds it most revenue-reliable. Maybe, both 'facts' are really just rumors, and/or 'player-facts' that fit an argument.  🤷‍♂️

[voltaicbore.8012]

I'm fine with the vision portrayed in the concept art, but I'd like to reiterate that what folks like @Ashantara.8731 and @Elricht Kaltwind.8796 are trying to express is not so much "future theme bad just because it's future-y" as "there's more acceptable and less acceptable implementations of future theme." Ash of course has made it quite clear they doubt the implementation is going to suit their tastes, while Elricht's post on page 2 expresses more hope it'll work out.

I'm in the hope-it'll-work-out camp myself. Looking back at Rata Sum and Rata Novus, I was impressed by how the various magitech consoles and holoprojections somehow looked just fine against the backdrop of stone architecture (complete with some moss & vines in the case of Rata Sum). I'm not a designer or artist by any stretch, but I'm assuming some amount of care was put into intentionally making that happen, and I for one think it worked.

My hope is that a similar "this is clearly a bit futuristic, but artistically it still fits" effect will define Kaineng. Either way ANet got my 30 bucks and I'm not at all excited by any of the other options I'll have in 2022, so I'll be here anyways.

[Sobx.1758]

7 hours ago, witcher.3197 said:

Because the way I see it people are less invested in the world of Tyria than they were a decade ago.

Less invested in the world, how? And what exactly are you basing this on?

Quote

Or rather they are still invested in GW1, but not in the GW2 story.

Who? Players playing gw2 for the past 9 years? Seems like a baseless claim for the most part.

Quote

That's why here we are, 10 years after launch, still digging up GW1 locations to butcher for profit.

It's still the same world. It's kind of funny, because that's the type of complaint that will find way to blame something either way. They re-introduce the zones in gw2? "Buchering for profit!" They don't re-introduce those zones? "OMG, this is still world of Tyria, why are these zones no longer here?!"

Basically: can't win if you're set on complaining anyways. If you want to play gw1 so much, then go play gw1. Yet you play gw2 for years, but on any hint of moving forward you'll complain (and, again, we've been already moving forward since the release of the gw2, even if some people would rather pretend otherwise in this thread). What's even the point of that?

Quote

GW2 tried to be its own thing and failed

Failed when? 😄

Quote

Anet is forced to cater to the GW1 crowd

If they wanted to somehow exclusively "cater to gw1 crowd", they'd keep introducing content to gw1.

Quote

but the devs are just as uninterested in doing that as they were 10 years ago. The result: we get to go to Cantha, because the name sells, but what we get won't be Cantha.

No, you seem to be slightly confused here: it is cantha, but it's not cantha from the past. Since this is not the past nor it is gw1. It really isn't that complicated.

Edited December 22, 2021 by Sobx.1758

[zealex.9410]

On 12/22/2021 at 11:18 AM, witcher.3197 said:

Yes, but in a way that fit into the world. I talked about how advancements can happen without issue as long as it's within the scope of the original vision. I think GW1 asura still fit into that. Their gimmick was imbuing stone constructs with magic, bringing them to life which isn't all that different to what a necromancer does, they were like the other side of the same coin. I could buy into the magic part.

What also served to balance them out was their architecture which was arguably more primitive than that of humans, and blended really well into nature. Some of their labs were just caverns and their towns were very far from urban. They had things they were technologically superior at, and things they were weaker at. GW2 asura is just straight up a sci-fi civilization and I'm not buying that any magic is involved. It's not magitech, just tech. Same goes for Cantha, are the writers going to tell me it's a "magic microwave"? Cmon, I know what a microwave is and it for sure isn't magic..

In GW2, Anet is just using "magic" as a synonym for electricity. Sure, you could argue both are energy, but I think how they're used is what distinguishes the two, and there is nothing "magical" about the way GW2 handles magitech.

Canthan magitech feels alot more like they found batteries while afaik asura kostly relied on leylines and their own magic. Actually not sure how much the magic system has been expanded  in the guild wars universe. 

In ff14 its aether that powers anything magic related except for one faction that uses a mineral which very potent magical properties (like canthans with dragon jade).

Afaik only canthans in gw2 are really all about that industrial style and i think their aplications of magic aplication reflects this nicely.

[zealex.9410]

16 hours ago, voltaicbore.8012 said:

I'm fine with the vision portrayed in the concept art, but I'd like to reiterate that what folks like @Ashantara.8731 and @Elricht Kaltwind.8796 are trying to express is not so much "future theme bad just because it's future-y" as "there's more acceptable and less acceptable implementations of future theme." Ash of course has made it quite clear they doubt the implementation is going to suit their tastes, while Elricht's post on page 2 expresses more hope it'll work out.

I'm in the hope-it'll-work-out camp myself. Looking back at Rata Sum and Rata Novus, I was impressed by how the various magitech consoles and holoprojections somehow looked just fine against the backdrop of stone architecture (complete with some moss & vines in the case of Rata Sum). I'm not a designer or artist by any stretch, but I'm assuming some amount of care was put into intentionally making that happen, and I for one think it worked.

My hope is that a similar "this is clearly a bit futuristic, but artistically it still fits" effect will define Kaineng. Either way ANet got my 30 bucks and I'm not at all excited by any of the other options I'll have in 2022, so I'll be here anyways.

Frankly i think the op was ok with asura's depiction of thech because it looks more alien than anything. Canthan's depiction hits abit close to home with rn examples but asura could be aliens we met in the mists and it would be fine.

[zealex.9410]

Another thing worth mentioning is that even by gw1 standards canthan's were the most advanced looking human faction out of all the human factions in gw1. You could argue pre seasing ascalon was up there but outaide of overpopulation kaineng even had its own seweage system which afaict wasnt really a thing in la or elona maybe not even ascalon.

[Witch of Doom.5739]

I think it looks very intriguing, and mostly what I want from EoD visuals is to be different from what we have in the base game, HoT, and PoF, so yeah, I hope it really looks like this!

[Cynder.2509]

As much as I love the cyberpunk genre I don't think it's very fitting for GW2. The futuristic artwork taht was posted mighta ctaully only be a tribute and not a confirmed reality for the upcoming content. 
Even though a lot in GW2 is considered something called science fantasy in its own unique way. 
Even the Elder Scrolls series has a slight science fantasy touch within its lore with the dwemer. 
Both franchises are my favorites as they both have a very unique and interesting worldbuilding apart from the typical fantasy genre. 

[Obliviscaris.6937]

As someone who has fantasized about this kind of cyber-fantasy Kaineng city years and years ago - imagining an environment at night with neon lights and lanterns, smoke gently drifting out of shisha lounges into the street, peddlers hocking wares, food carts, the lights reflected in puddles on rainy nights...

 

I mean that concept art of New Kaineng, I find to be incredibly inspired. A-net could create a brilliant atmosphere. I believe their art team will absolutely achieve something like this.

Edited December 27, 2021 by Obliviscaris.6937

[veritech.1048]

Thanks, I hate it.

[Scolix.4879]

On 12/17/2021 at 8:31 PM, Ashantara.8731 said:

I disagree. It feels forced.

It's like "The Legend of Korra" compared to "Avatar: The Last Airbender" - the latter was fantastic, because it had a uniform style and feel to it; the former is terrible in comparison, because it mixes old and new in a way where things just feel out of place, which is what happens when you wildly mix not only genres but also different time eras that don't go well together.

GW2 is not a science-fiction game. If they are going to turn it into one, they will see large numbers of loyal, paying customers leave. I doubt the younger generation is going to invest as much real money as us veteran players have for over nine years.

Are we playing the same game?

Asura have magitech Charr have steampunk stuff. There are airships, mechs cars mopeds helicopters and rolling beetles that are like phantom menace podracers.

That city doesn't look anymore weird to me than stuff i mentioned previously and i am glad that different places look different and have different tech the game would be extremely boring if everything was just knight in shiny armor crap in medieval setting and the zones were like wow's most boring zone the nagrand.

[veritech.1048]

14 hours ago, Scolix.4879 said:

Are we playing the same game?

Asura have magitech Charr have steampunk stuff. There are airships, mechs cars mopeds helicopters and rolling beetles that are like phantom menace podracers.

That city doesn't look anymore weird to me than stuff i mentioned previously and i am glad that different places look different and have different tech the game would be extremely boring if everything was just knight in shiny armor crap in medieval setting and the zones were like wow's most boring zone the nagrand.

It's actually sort of weird, considering Cantha has been locked off from the world and is suddenly appearing way more advanced than everyone else. Wakanda is silly, societies usually advance through tech because of conflict. It would make 100% more sense to go back to Cantha and realize they haven't changed much because they decided to be backwards and lock out everyone.

 

Jade Runner just comes across as bad writing, but that's honestly par for the course for this game.

[Donut.6914]

I am also pretty sick of the clean sterile shiny magitech aesthetic, Asura have that vibe more than covered. However the upper part of Kaineng in GW1 was also clean shiny and sterile, while the undercity and slums were dirty masses of shanty towns stacked on top of each other. Just please do not throw away the slums in GW2, it would be a huge missed opportunity for GW2's great movement system.

[witcher.3197]

People keep saying asura use magitech but honestly, where's the "magi" part? Holographic consoles aren't "magic", neither are microwaves in Cantha. We went full sci-fi.

I feel sorry for people defending this writing. It's clear that Anet doesn't care about worldbuilding, they just thought Cyberpunk 2077 looked cool so they wanted to make their own version whether it made sense or not.

Edited January 5, 2022 by witcher.3197

[Sobx.1758]

3 hours ago, witcher.3197 said:

People keep saying asura use magitech but honestly, where's the "magi" part? Holographic consoles aren't "magic", neither are microwaves in Cantha. We went full sci-fi.

I feel sorry for people defending this writing. It's clear that Anet doesn't care about worldbuilding, they just thought Cyberpunk 2077 looked cool so they wanted to make their own version whether it made sense or not.

I mean... it's clear you don't care about worldbuilding, but just about replaying what you already know and feeding your melancholy instead. Moving forward? Progress? NAAAH, bad writing [since it's not what gw1 was]. 🤷‍♂️

If you want to stay in the past, launch gw1 instead.

Edited January 5, 2022 by Sobx.1758

[witcher.3197]

1 hour ago, Sobx.1758 said:

I mean... it's clear you don't care about worldbuilding, but just about replaying what you already know and feeding your melancholy instead. Moving forward? Progress? NAAAH, bad writing [since it's not what gw1 was]. 🤷‍♂️

If you want to stay in the past, launch gw1 instead.

So every change is good because "old bad, new good"

Flawless logic dude

If you want cyberpunk, launch Cyberpunk 2077. I'm here for Cantha, you're not.

[Sigmoid.7082]

 

 

56 minutes ago, witcher.3197 said:

So every change is good because "old bad, new good"

Flawless logic dude

 

I'm here for Cantha, you're not.

By these standards you can say your logic is also flawless . Since its comes across very much "old good, new bad".

 

I also think that's the point. You're not here for Cantha either. You're here for Cantha as you remember it and wanted it to evolve.  Anet doesn't not care about world building because they aren't adhering to what you think they should be doing.