What?

[Batalix.2873]

54 minutes ago, Panda.1967 said:

You do know that twice now Arena Net has attempted to do away with full size expansions in favor of living world only for them to fold and release an actual expansion right? Originally there were not going to be expansions, the original plan for GW2 was to expand the world overtime through the Living World system, which at the time was a series of limited time events that built up the lore of the world. This ultimately failed due to the limited time nature of the original Living World system. That lead into the release of Living World S2 to build up for the first ever expansion, Heart of Thorns…. Fast forward several years, LWs4 and PoF have all released… Arena Net decides that they want to try again with Living World being how the game progresses from now on… so they release Ice Brood Saga, promising to be a bigger better living world experience than ever before to make up for the fact that there won’t be any more expansions… and… it failed… they quickly shift gears and start work on EoD after seeing how bad Ice Brood Saga is as an expansion replacement… not ready to give up on having no more expansions, Arena Net is trying on e more now with SotO… a “mini-expansion” but its fooling noone… we all know its just Living World repackaged under a new name and release model… it too will fail…

Eh not guaranteed to fail. It may be a very questionable decision but you can't say they haven't tried to adapt with each failure. First LW, then "sagas", now just outright terming and branding them as expansions. We can't really know if this new attempt will fail at duping players like the previous ones did, because variables have changed.

That said, my predictions are also that this is a risky move that will likely not pay off. They are alienating veteran players by obviating old systems/features. And they aren't likely to retain many new players with no real new features. Old players have little new that was designed for them. New players may get easier access to things but now have little reason to invest money and hours into everything that came before.

It's a lot of marketing trying to cover up a very thin release, and so I do think despite appearances this will go over about as well as IBS. Doubly so since I think no matter how cool or appropriate Wizard's Tower and cryptids are, a lot of potential new buyers will look at it and just see a Dragonflight or Tears of the Kingdom ripoff.

And that's not even addressing what a PR mess the partners have been, throwing around the term "battle pass" as clickbait and likely scaring away a lot of people who haven't read the details of SotO more closely.

The optics of SotO are not good from several angles. I don't know what the hell ANet thinks they are doing but it's turtles all the way down.

Edited July 8, 2023 by Batalix.2873

[Ruisenior.6342]

The worst part is people buying it

[Ashantara.8731]

On 6/28/2023 at 1:36 AM, ReaverKane.7598 said:

LOL Season 4, best quality? Maybe after the fact.

Maybe, but it truly shines in comparison.

On 6/28/2023 at 1:36 AM, ReaverKane.7598 said:

Kinda like the Star Wars prequels are now quite good compared to the sequels...

They are both bad for different reasons. 😉

[Infinity.1087]

Devs' got to eat too. The price is not that bad considering inflation and the current market. Although, I definitely would've done it without the whole relic system change and introduced a new mechanic like jade bot instead. Would've saved them from a lot of vitriol. 

[Gazrul.3086]

10 hours ago, Panda.1967 said:

so they release Ice Brood Saga, promising to be a bigger better living world experience than ever before to make up for the fact that there won’t be any more expansions… and… it failed…

It only failed because they rushed Champions though. The episodes before that were pretty good, and Grothmar, Bjora and Drizzlewood are still quite popular. 

[Geralt.7519]

8 hours ago, Infinity.1087 said:

The price is not that bad

Price is not bad at all, it's less than 2 months of WoW lol, true that GW2 doesn't have the same amount of content WoW has but GW2 doesn't have a sub either.

[asterix.9614]

Gw2 players can be so kitten cheap sometimes, makes me cringe internally. Hope op is trolling (as the price is cheap and no one is forcing him to buy), if not 😡

Edited July 9, 2023 by asterix.9614

[Poormany.4507]

6 hours ago, asterix.9614 said:

Gw2 players can be so kitten cheap sometimes, makes me cringe internally. Hope op is trolling (as the price is cheap and no one is forcing him to buy), if not 😡

It's cause we got spoiled so much with free LW for the past decade or so, which is extremely generous for the content provided, especially compared to the price of other games. LWS4 could have easily been sold as a full expac for its quality and features (2 new mounts + multiple high quality, repeatable maps (except Kourna)), but instead we got it entirely for free (provided you only logged in and had PoF).

Edited July 9, 2023 by Poormany.4507

[TashaFoxx.7862]

6 hours ago, Geralt.7519 said:

Price is not bad at all, it's less than 2 months of WoW lol, true that GW2 doesn't have the same amount of content WoW has but GW2 doesn't have a sub either.

I would rather pay them 5$ a month and receive actual content - and good balance devs while at it 🙄

[Juan.6124]

Have you ever bought a 2k gems mount skin with real money?

[Batalix.2873]

On 7/9/2023 at 6:20 AM, GetFoxxed.9478 said:

I would rather pay them 5$ a month and receive actual content - and good balance devs while at it 🙄

In retrospect the "subscriptionless" model is really bizarre and I think there is definitely a reasonable case to be made that it has been sabotaging their profits and development resources the entire time.

It might have made sense in 2012 to try to compete with the only real industry standard (WoW), but massive online games are pretty common nowadays and a lot of them have subscription models.

At this point I think switching would be futile, though. I would not pay 1-2 years of subscription fees on the mere hope that ANet might get it together. The company has been too mismanaged at this point, don't trust 'em.

[GEGEZZ.7563]

As some people said previously in  their own manner, content wise, this game looks 4 times cheaper, if not more, than most MMOs.

Only thing that kept things together so far was the gem shop and keys probably, but i'm pretty sure the skin sales have decreased a lot by now : after getting a few skins, most people feel satisfied with them and progressively stop buying them once they have one or or a few they like in each category (unless compulsory buyers, addicted, or rich to sum things up).

What Anet can do now is ask players to actually pay for content more regularly because the shop certainly doesn't work as well as before, and people also buy more skins if they are entertained by the game, content which got cleared by a majority of players by now. Game is 10 years old....

The true winners so far in this are not really Anet but the people who never or nearly never bought gold and skins, because they certainly used more money worth from the devs than what they paid for.

Now the game balances back its monetization towards where the money is : content releases, and to me that's a very, very good sign, because if content is what drives the company's revenue now, they also have themselves a bigger incentive to provide said content, where some years ago their financial interest was rather providing minimal/decent content to make people buy content related skins.

Now we rather seem to pay for content instead, or at least in a bigger part. The people who would be most upset about this are the people who buy rarely from shop because they actually have to pay something more in relation with what they are using as customers. The main reason for this change seems to me that an increasing number of players end up with this profile : people who rarely bought from shop won't start doing it now, and people who used to do it tend to stop doing it because they already bought what they wanted.

You want content ? Pay for it, that's the best way to get some. This had to happen eventually. Just look at other MMO prices. Devs are not cheap asking to pay for new content now, they rather made money with vanity to compensate cheap release prices, and that doesn't work as well now after all that time. That's it.

[Holgarf.6581]

On 6/27/2023 at 11:10 PM, Randulf.7614 said:

People will buy it. I know I will. I don't think £20 is unresaonable for 3 maps in an ongoing mmo. We have just been spoiled by a considerable amount of free content.

As I have said before, if the quantity isn't there, they need to deliver on quality. I think they will get a free pass on this one and if they don't deliver the quality this time, that risks a problem next time

I'm not envisioning any significant sales problems here though

It won't because of *fear of missing out*.

EoD was lacking imo. Very rushed. Rough around the edges. The maps were pretty badly designed, the living world events in said maps were poor. The map population was terrible and the lack of NPCs only added to that. To ask for money, since some people are saying we got a bunch of free stuff... is a bit much. We pay for expansions and expect a certain amount. EoD provided very little comparatively and post-EoD episodes were lacking, yet people are giving them a pass already because of biased allegiances and their own justification for wanting to purchase it. It's a money grab.

Now if we'd had years of engine updates, extra polish, a plethora of bug fixes and QoL improvements regularly, I'd be less bitter at Anet over the years. But frankly I am tired of people making excuses for every point on Arena Net's behalf. People should expect more. And it's not about the cost of the expansion either, or the choice not to buy it, it's about principle.

With so much content being unrepeatable and borderline unplayable without the begging of randoms or guilds, I fear this game is becoming too cluttered and tiresome in it's approach. Maybe henchmen really are needed now?

I did not expect to see a limited expansion so early on (it hasn't even been two years since EoD released), especially considering post (main EoD) episodes were very few.

People often dislike my controversial opinions, and while I agree the story content is good, Living World is lacking these days (particularly single player content), classes are blending together in the name of flexibility, balance patches keep obliterating my class / equipment builds and botting is rampant in every area of the game. Truth hurts, people don't like it and they fight against it.

I expected more. I'd have paid willingly for it too. Will I skip this? Probably not, let's be real, but I'm not pre-ordering and it'll be the first *expansion* that I opt for the lowest tier. By the time I manage to catch up and play SotO, much of the content will require my begging to others. I'm still having a hard time in Tower of Nightmares lol.

[Knighthonor.4061]

On 7/8/2023 at 3:05 PM, Panda.1967 said:

You do know that twice now Arena Net has attempted to do away with full size expansions in favor of living world only for them to fold and release an actual expansion right? Originally there were not going to be expansions, the original plan for GW2 was to expand the world overtime through the Living World system, which at the time was a series of limited time events that built up the lore of the world. This ultimately failed due to the limited time nature of the original Living World system. That lead into the release of Living World S2 to build up for the first ever expansion, Heart of Thorns…. Fast forward several years, LWs4 and PoF have all released… Arena Net decides that they want to try again with Living World being how the game progresses from now on… so they release Ice Brood Saga, promising to be a bigger better living world experience than ever before to make up for the fact that there won’t be any more expansions… and… it failed… they quickly shift gears and start work on EoD after seeing how bad Ice Brood Saga is as an expansion replacement… not ready to give up on having no more expansions, Arena Net is trying on e more now with SotO… a “mini-expansion” but its fooling noone… we all know its just Living World repackaged under a new name and release model… it too will fail…

I agree with this. I hope this is prep for the lore of the world so that it can be used in Guild Wars 3. It sounds like a bad idea no matter how I try to spin it, but of the bad ideas this would be the best case use of this flawed direction unless Mini Expansions are just replacements for Living Story between major expansions like before.

[Holgarf.6581]

14 hours ago, Knighthonor.4061 said:

I agree with this. I hope this is prep for the lore of the world so that it can be used in Guild Wars 3. It sounds like a bad idea no matter how I try to spin it, but of the bad ideas this would be the best case use of this flawed direction unless Mini Expansions are just replacements for Living Story between major expansions like before.

It is episodic content under the guise of an expansion and it comes with a reduction in the full expansion price tag, although since you get significantly less and the discount not significant, I wouldn't really consider it cheaper. It's a calculated decision based on player interaction, active numbers, trends and a boost in revenue of course (that's actually the primary driving force). But again, I'll forever be pointing to where most of our money really went (back pockets) and point to how neglected the game engine is and lacking significantly in QoL updates / polish despite *supporting* ANet through heinous microtransactions . It's a business, I get it and my justified and pin-point whining isn't here to encourage others to feel the same. It is merely observation. However GW3 is likely to be much of the same as GW2, so I fear there's little reason to go to it, especially since my contribution didn't get me any improvements that I wanted - it went to rushed third major expansion and constant skin development. After thousands of hours spent, maybe at that point (if GW3 ever did come) it'd be time to try something new?

And as I said before, this so-called expansion is stuff that would likely have been free as part of the expansion experience of episodic content, perhaps monetised in some form, optionally, but not directly and as brazenly.

With the speed at which this content was made... giving how rough End of Dragons was... everything from Open World / Living World events, restricted NPC dialogue, dialogue references, NPC population, interactions with NPCs and the environment, event design, texture placement, spawn points, poor map design leaving swatches of permanently unvisited areas, poorly accessible areas, horrendous difficulty/population event scaling, outright dead maps and population limits, event bugs, no reason to revisit most of the maps, lack of diverse event types, botting zones, yada yada yada..., including introductions of core systems (fishing) that directly go towards encouraging further real monetary spending... then I have a massive concern with how rough SotO is going to be considering how short of a development time it has had.

One of the major things Anet need to stop doing is creating content that once completed, has little appeal and I feel SotO is going to be much the same. Nearly all of the world maps are this way, and it means that unless you're rushing to catch up, or if you're a late comer and skip to that latest release, coming back 6-12 months later or at your own pace means you're going to have a hell of a time trying to find people to do things with - and I don't care if people say "I can find someone in 5 minutes" or "ask a guild", it isn't always that simple. It quickly makes an MMORPG feel like a single-player world with terrible difficulty scaling (not that the game is difficult, but hopefully some of you understand my meaning). And address the DPS everything mentality! GW2 was meant to be about throwing away with traditional MMO tropes (something I shunned for a long time), but instead GW2 has landed in this awkward half-half approach of it's own, mixed with tradition, which then further varies depending on the content in question and it makes a mess. Presumably this was done to further increase equipment and build slot sales?

IBS had some interesting aspects in it, that didn't focus solely on DPS content where everyone was rotating their entire array of skills.

And AoE. It seems to be the default for all player skills and mob rushes and mob AoE bombs seem to be the choice for enemy design - this has been the case for years. Imagine single target weaponry now lmao. This game has slid so far off of the scale, it's unreal. Anet designers remind me of the ardent and ignorance of the writer's guild.

Finally (and selfishly 😉) bring back Guardian Staff to how it used to be back in the day, change Guardian Scepter so it doesn't suck and doesn't make that awful noise (I think everybody agrees, it is bloody awful) and make core classes good again. I know... if you make core classes too dope then why would people buy expansions, right? Well, I want to play core classes and I've bought every expansion since. Also, hammer improvements for Guardian ;0 (I know, I can be selfish).

[Stelawrat.6589]

On 7/9/2023 at 3:19 AM, asterix.9614 said:

Gw2 players can be so kitten cheap sometimes, makes me cringe internally. Hope op is trolling (as the price is cheap and no one is forcing him to buy), if not 😡

 

On 7/9/2023 at 9:18 AM, Poormany.4507 said:

It's cause we got spoiled so much with free LW for the past decade or so, which is extremely generous for the content provided, especially compared to the price of other games. LWS4 could have easily been sold as a full expac for its quality and features (2 new mounts + multiple high quality, repeatable maps (except Kourna)), but instead we got it entirely for free (provided you only logged in and had PoF).

I agree with Poormany. Compared to other games, GW2 has totally spoiled me. The sheer volume of content, much of it I've even yet to discover, together with the incredible beauty, the attention to detail & overall quality, just everything about the game is second to none as far as I'm concerned. 

When I bought the game initially, I bought the Standard edition to see if I liked it. I was so impressed that within a week, I upgraded that purchase to the Deluxe edition & also bought the original Guild Wars game at the same time. Since then I've pre-purchased either the Deluxe or Ultimate editions of each expansion, depending on the conversion rate at the time, including EoD Ultimate, which I personally feel I got burned on, which is my own fault. 

So asterix & those who agree with him, rest assured that I'm not trolling, or being cheap when my decision for now at least, is not to pre-purchase any edition of Secrets considering what it has to offer at this time, vesus the current dollar conversion rate.

Taxes included, today the Standard would cost 38$ CAD, the Ultimate 114$ CAD, not cheap by anyone's standards I don't think. Unless it's a total washout, it's a given that I will eventually buy the Standard edition. From this boomer's pov, there's no harm in waiting. 😛 

[Ruisenior.6342]

On 7/10/2023 at 8:23 PM, GEGEZZ.7563 said:

As some people said previously in  their own manner, content wise, this game looks 4 times cheaper, if not more, than most MMOs.

Only thing that kept things together so far was the gem shop and keys probably, but i'm pretty sure the skin sales have decreased a lot by now : after getting a few skins, most people feel satisfied with them and progressively stop buying them once they have one or or a few they like in each category (unless compulsory buyers, addicted, or rich to sum things up).

What Anet can do now is ask players to actually pay for content more regularly because the shop certainly doesn't work as well as before, and people also buy more skins if they are entertained by the game, content which got cleared by a majority of players by now. Game is 10 years old....

The true winners so far in this are not really Anet but the people who never or nearly never bought gold and skins, because they certainly used more money worth from the devs than what they paid for.

Now the game balances back its monetization towards where the money is : content releases, and to me that's a very, very good sign, because if content is what drives the company's revenue now, they also have themselves a bigger incentive to provide said content, where some years ago their financial interest was rather providing minimal/decent content to make people buy content related skins.

Now we rather seem to pay for content instead, or at least in a bigger part. The people who would be most upset about this are the people who buy rarely from shop because they actually have to pay something more in relation with what they are using as customers. The main reason for this change seems to me that an increasing number of players end up with this profile : people who rarely bought from shop won't start doing it now, and people who used to do it tend to stop doing it because they already bought what they wanted.

You want content ? Pay for it, that's the best way to get some. This had to happen eventually. Just look at other MMO prices. Devs are not cheap asking to pay for new content now, they rather made money with vanity to compensate cheap release prices, and that doesn't work as well now after all that time. That's it.

Now if that content was actually good but..

[ShatteredStars.6548]

On 7/8/2023 at 6:24 PM, Infinity.1087 said:

Devs' got to eat too. The price is not that bad considering inflation and the current market. Although, I definitely would've done it without the whole relic system change and introduced a new mechanic like jade bot instead. Would've saved them from a lot of vitriol. 

It seems no one cares about how hard the devs have to work, because in a lot of threads, they keep bashing the devs, which is not right.

Edited July 24, 2023 by TheRunningSquire.3621

[Dante.1508]

Lots of people are saying its worth it but the content in my opinion seems low.. Runes, Relics, mount skills, old weapons on any specs, legendary armor.. that's really all fluff.

Where the meat is is in the stories and map content the loot and the extras.. and honestly that's looking slim.

7 hours ago, TheRunningSquire.3621 said:

It seems no one cares about how hard the devs have to work, because in a lot of threads, they keep bashing the devs, which is not right.

Well to be fair EoD and Gyala Delve really didn't satisfy the players and they worry for future releases.. Its not Dev hate its Wasting money in a terrible economy..

Edited July 24, 2023 by Dante.1508

[jokke.6239]

On 7/9/2023 at 3:18 PM, Poormany.4507 said:

It's cause we got spoiled so much with free LW for the past decade or so, which is extremely generous for the content provided, especially compared to the price of other games. LWS4 could have easily been sold as a full expac for its quality and features (2 new mounts + multiple high quality, repeatable maps (except Kourna)), but instead we got it entirely for free (provided you only logged in and had PoF).

I know. Worst part is people using it against them.

"Now we have to PAY for living story episodes"

Instead of appreciating the generous free content they have gotten

[SoftFootpaws.9134]

they always sold living story if you weren't here to log in and get it for free when it released. newer players had to pay massive amounts of money when joining the game to catch up, on top of the cost of the expansions (over 4k of gems, i think, which is $50 usd).

 

i think the new system is much easier for new players, just by the expansions and get everything. in fact i hope they merge the old living world seasons into their relevant expansions so i can finally invite players to the game and not have them leave when they lean about he hot mess that is "the dlc". i can only farm so much gold to buy it for people to keep them playing the game and not throwing in the towel out of confusion.

 

you have to understand how bizare this system is compared to other games, why it always dragged the game down.

Edited July 24, 2023 by SoftFootpaws.9134

[Astralporing.1957]

11 hours ago, TheRunningSquire.3621 said:

It seems no one cares about how hard the devs have to work, because in a lot of threads, they keep bashing the devs, which is not right.

I'm not running a charity. I am buying a product - so obviously what i want to know is whether the product is good for the money. If it's not then it doesn't really matter how hard someone worked on it.

[The Boz.2038]

11 hours ago, TheRunningSquire.3621 said:

It seems no one cares about how hard the devs have to work, because in a lot of threads, they keep bashing the devs, which is not right.

The labor theory of value has been proven to be entirely without merit.

[Gibson.4036]

1 hour ago, The Boz.2038 said:

The labor theory of value has been proven to be entirely without merit.

Well, yeah. Our entire system is organized around rewarding the ownership of capital, not labor.

[Astralporing.1957]

2 hours ago, Gibson.4036 said:

Well, yeah. Our entire system is organized around rewarding the ownership of capital, not labor.

It's not even that. It's much simpler. If two people were to make a product of the same quality, but one of them worked twice as hard as the other to get the same result, which of them two would you value more?