ArenaNet's Approach: Analyzing GW2's Feature Lifecycle - What Lies Ahead????

[Assolador.3598]

With each new expansion, ArenaNet seems to halt support or place yet another feature into maintenance mode. Dungeons, PvP, raids, underwater combat, guild halls, and guilds themselves—none have been spared. Even Living Worlds and POSSIBLY elite specs. fractals and WvW see minimal updates. Remember Silent Surf? What about the long-awaited Alliances, announced half a decade ago? Strikes, Dagda – a disaster, IBS levels of bad. Cerus is decent, the only saving grace amidst the mess that is SoTO, With the exception of its exceptional storytelling.

Rifts were announced as the main feature of the expansion, promising thrilling rift hunts, but they devolved into an unbearable grind. All this while, ArenaNet seems engrossed in their new Unreal Engine project, leaving GW2 in a sorry state. Why rework runes? And that FOMO machine called dailies? Sure, some improvements were made, but was it necessary? Many neglected aspects of the game cry out for attention. What exactly is ArenaNet doing? Updating the engine? Still laboring on SoTO? Perhaps preparing for the next expansion? Is this Unreal Engine project even related to GW2?

When they say "support core features," does it mean needlessly reworking a system that wasn't broken but merely inconvenient? Although I know a dev might read this, the silence from their end is deafening. Yet, amidst the chaos, ArenaNet is busy crafting new MTX with shiny effects, supported eagerly on forums, alongside almost useless bug fixes.

I genuinely want to remain positive about the game's development, but the rampant neglect of crucial issues is driving me away. Despite my initial excitement for SoTO, I'll hold off on the next expansion until I see what it truly offers. If you have any positive experiences with GW2, please share. All I can see now is the disheartening descent into "surprise CM maintenance mode." Good luck out there, and thanks for enduring this poorly articulated post.🙂

[Linken.6345]

23 minutes ago, Assolador.3598 said:

With each new expansion, ArenaNet seems to halt support or place yet another feature into maintenance mode. Dungeons, PvP, raids, underwater combat, guild halls, and guilds themselves—none have been spared. Even Living Worlds and POSSIBLY elite specs. fractals and WvW see minimal updates. Remember Silent Surf? What about the long-awaited Alliances, announced half a decade ago? Strikes, Dagda – a disaster, IBS levels of bad. Cerus is decent, the only saving grace amidst the mess that is SoTO, With the exception of its exceptional storytelling.

Rifts were announced as the main feature of the expansion, promising thrilling rift hunts, but they devolved into an unbearable grind. All this while, ArenaNet seems engrossed in their new Unreal Engine project, leaving GW2 in a sorry state. Why rework runes? And that FOMO machine called dailies? Sure, some improvements were made, but was it necessary? Many neglected aspects of the game cry out for attention. What exactly is ArenaNet doing? Updating the engine? Still laboring on SoTO? Perhaps preparing for the next expansion? Is this Unreal Engine project even related to GW2?

When they say "support core features," does it mean needlessly reworking a system that wasn't broken but merely inconvenient? Although I know a dev might read this, the silence from their end is deafening. Yet, amidst the chaos, ArenaNet is busy crafting new MTX with shiny effects, supported eagerly on forums, alongside almost useless bug fixes.

I genuinely want to remain positive about the game's development, but the rampant neglect of crucial issues is driving me away. Despite my initial excitement for SoTO, I'll hold off on the next expansion until I see what it truly offers. If you have any positive experiences with GW2, please share. All I can see now is the disheartening descent into "surprise CM maintenance mode." Good luck out there, and thanks for enduring this poorly articulated post.🙂

Ya I am 1 mini expansion ahead of you waiting on the full SotO to come out to judge its worth.

[illuminati.8453]

2 hours ago, Assolador.3598 said:

I genuinely want to remain positive about the game's development, but the rampant neglect of crucial issues is driving me away. 

I've never seen a company abandon features as much as Anet.   The core game was pretty solid, the combat was different enough to keep players attention all this time, but their recent development effort is so awful that they are going to just fail from neglect (as you are experiencing).   

This company make no sense.  For instance, why have they not come up with new utility things to sell us in the gem shop?  I would buy them all, but they don't even try.

I really wish the IP would transfer to another studio, that might give us some hope for the future of GW2.  If it stays with ANet then one day we are going to wake up to a shutdown notice. 

[Bladestrom.6425]

22 minutes ago, illuminati.8453 said:

I've never seen a company abandon features as much as Anet.   The core game was pretty solid, the combat was different enough to keep players attention all this time, but their recent development effort is so awful that they are going to just fail from neglect (as you are experiencing).   

This company make no sense.  For instance, why have they not come up with new utility things to sell us in the gem shop?  I would buy them all, but they don't even try.

I really wish the IP would transfer to another studio, that might give us some hope for the future of GW2.  If it stays with ANet then one day we are going to wake up to a shutdown notice. 

.Many people have played this game for 10 + years with thousands of hours played, If these people played other AAA MMORPG in that time they would have payed an additional £1000 in subs.  These people are still playing fresh content today after thousands of hours that does involve a gear hamster wheel with most old content dead.  Now lets look at GW2 in more detail:

- Vast complex beautiful world that is not dead.

- A hugely diverse set of builds that are all viable and way beyond the diversity in other AAA MMORPG

- Best wvw in AAA mmorpg market, with best performance.

- A healthy community where smart design decisions means toxicity is largely in check, for e.g shared nodes. 

- no pay to win, no gear treadmill, focus on the majority not the elite minority.

- No Sub, But we still get good content updates, as good as anything in the  market.

- Technically best in market.  If in doubt go look at ESO, the game performance is a train wreck, down time for updates, major lag issues, broken mechanics that punishes those that don't spam spells. 

Now you go try and design a game that will last over 10 years that has satisfied millions over the years with no sub, that takes real skill and smart stewardship.  

 

 

- 

 

Edited October 6, 2023 by vesica tempestas.1563

[illuminati.8453]

6 minutes ago, vesica tempestas.1563 said:

Now you go try and design a game that will last over 10 years that has satisfied millions over the years with no sub, that takes real skill and smart stewardship.  

Been there, done that.   ANet lucked into the longevity of this game, not because they are exceptional developers.   Early on they clearly had drive and a desire to succeed.  That is no longer the case. 

[Assolador.3598]

7 minutes ago, vesica tempestas.1563 said:

.Many people have played this game for 10 + years with thousands of hours played, If these people played other AAA MMORPG in that time they would have payed an additional £1000 in subs.  These people are still playing fresh content today after thousands of hours that does involve a gear hamster wheel with most old content dead.  Now lets look at GW2 in more detail:

- Vast complex beautiful world that is not dead.

- A hugely diverse set of builds that are all viable and way beyond the diversity in other AAA MMORPG

- Best wvw in AAA mmorpg market, with best performance.

- A healthy community where smart design decisions means toxicity is largely in check, for e.g shared nodes. 

- no pay to win, no gear treadmill, focus on the majority not the elite minority.

- No Sub, But we still get good content updates, as good as anything in the  market.

- Technically best in market.  If in doubt go look at ESO, the game performance is a train wreck, down time for updates, major lag issues, broken mechanics that punishes those that don't spam spells. 

Now you go try and design a game that will last over 10 years that has satisfied millions over the years with no sub, that takes real skill and smart stewardship.  

 

 

- 

 

absolutely agree! BUT those are the philosophy and features of gw2 since core and well, that's why im sticking here, but the future doesn't look promising, remember we're almost at the point of time with big mmo releases, anet need to keep up with it, and thats definitely NOT doing gw3. The next semi casual mmo with a lively world, will kill gw2

[Assolador.3598]

6 minutes ago, illuminati.8453 said:

Been there, done that.   ANet lucked into the longevity of this game, not because they are exceptional developers.   Early on they clearly had drive and a desire to succeed.  That is no longer the case. 

I honestly think gw2 is still on the market because almost every other mmo is pretty much trash on social aspects or it's wow/gear treadmill bs 😕

[illuminati.8453]

1 minute ago, Assolador.3598 said:

I honestly think gw2 is still on the market because almost every other mmo is pretty much trash on social aspects or it's wow/gear treadmill bs 😕

Underneath the years of neglect and all those decaying features lies a very solid game, in my opinion.  I agree with you, ANet had a solid approach to gear.

[Bladestrom.6425]

8 minutes ago, illuminati.8453 said:

Been there, done that.   ANet lucked into the longevity of this game, not because they are exceptional developers.   Early on they clearly had drive and a desire to succeed.  That is no longer the case. 

no idea what 'lucked out ' means.  Im having as much fun as I had 10 years ago.

[illuminati.8453]

Just now, vesica tempestas.1563 said:

no idea what 'lucked out ' means.  Im having as much fun as I had 10 years ago.

I'm glad you are, there is definitely fun to be had but many of us are starting to look at their development trend and are worried.  For me, the frustration with this company comes from the realization that the title could be in a lot better shape if they hadn't decided to move on. 

[Bladestrom.6425]

Just now, illuminati.8453 said:

I'm glad you are, there is definitely fun to be had but many of us are starting to look at their development trend and are worried.  For me, the frustration with this company comes from the realization that the title could be in a lot better shape if they hadn't decided to move on. 

well that does seem to be a trend doesn't it, where everyone is an expert on everything, and everyone has an opinion on how things can be so much better.  To Quote yourself for example (and i agree)

'I loved the Return to collection. It focused me after a long absence from the game and I would love to see another one like it. I'd even be willing to do Tears again for it. /shudder'

If you look for negatives in isolation. you will always find some, but ask yourself, do you think Blizzard or Bethesoft would do a better job?

[enigmatic.3576]

7 minutes ago, vesica tempestas.1563 said:

no idea what 'lucked out ' means.  Im having as much fun as I had 10 years ago.

Then you haven't played much.  

[Bladestrom.6425]

2 minutes ago, enigmatic.3576 said:

Then you haven't played much.  

mm, 5k hours on my main. And for that matter 10k in wow, 3k in ESO, 1k in LOTR, 500 in Rift etc.  i have played mmorpg a fair bit, and GW2 is a class above in my personal opinion.

Edited October 6, 2023 by vesica tempestas.1563

[Assolador.3598]

Just now, illuminati.8453 said:

I'm glad you are, there is definitely fun to be had but many of us are starting to look at their development trend and are worried.  For me, the frustration with this company comes from the realization that the title could be in a lot better shape if they hadn't decided to move on. 

exactly, I still have the most fun I ever had in mmos, >with old content< (pvp, wvw, raids, some core leg crafting), but let's be honest, who is this new content for? Im talking about rifts, we open a portal, kill adds oddly spread around, then a boss, get reward, repeat that same process for so so so many times, because essences are bound, and one of the only uses are leg armor(wich PROBABLY is bound too), the casual player will do this a little bit and stop doing it because it's not fun, and the ''hardcore'' ones will do it... in pain, I really do not think people should play the game while watching something else, is the game that bad to the point u need to do any other thing to bear it? This remembers me runescape. That is the first time I do something else while playing gw2, that's not the content the players deserve.

[enigmatic.3576]

Just now, vesica tempestas.1563 said:

mm, 5k hours on my main.

I was referring to the content as time isn't very relevant as someone can play for 10+ years just doing the dailies and leaving themselves AFK in the game.  Or they can have played for like 8K hours, started last year, and only did passive farming the entire time with their minionmancer.

[Assolador.3598]

5 minutes ago, vesica tempestas.1563 said:

well that does seem to be a trend doesn't it, where everyone is an expert on everything, and everyone has an opinion on how things can be so much better.  To Quote yourself for example (and i agree)

'I loved the Return to collection. It focused me after a long absence from the game and I would love to see another one like it. I'd even be willing to do Tears again for it. /shudder'

If you look for negatives in isolation. you will always find some, but ask yourself, do you think Blizzard or Bethesoft would do a better job?

return was the best pve non instanced experience I ever had in this game, and I really thought the new open world armor would be something like it, I was sooooo hyped about it...

[Bladestrom.6425]

Just now, enigmatic.3576 said:

I was referring to the content as time isn't very relevant as someone can play for 10+ years just doing the dailies and leaving themselves AFK in the game.  Or they can have played for like 8K hours, started last year, and only did passive farming the entire time with their minionmancer.

I played the content for 5k becuse i enjoyed playing, its a game, if i didn't i wouldn't.  

[illuminati.8453]

Just now, vesica tempestas.1563 said:

'I loved the Return to collection. It focused me after a long absence from the game and I would love to see another one like it. I'd even be willing to do Tears again for it. /shudder'

If you look for negatives in isolation. you will always find some, but ask yourself, do you think Blizzard or Bethesoft would do a better job?

Indeed I did enjoy that, and it clearly showed there were still in 'let's grow GW2' phase.  That phase is over. 

I don't think Anet is unique in the development fatigue that comes with MMOs.  Blizzard has experienced similar negativity with WoW, but what separates them is the response.  Blizzard will not quit, but Anet is throwing in the towel with their approach to GW2. 

For example, there are bugs that have been in the game for years and documented with clear steps to reproducing them, but ANet does nothing.  That is not a sign of a good studio, that is a sign that they do not care. 

[Vayne.8563]

16 minutes ago, illuminati.8453 said:

I'm glad you are, there is definitely fun to be had but many of us are starting to look at their development trend and are worried.  For me, the frustration with this company comes from the realization that the title could be in a lot better shape if they hadn't decided to move on. 

And many of us are still playing, having fun, and have no idea what you're talking about. 

Do you know why most games don't have abandoned content? Because most games don't have the same variety of content. But it's too soon to say a lot of the stuff you're saying. Suggesting guild halls may be abandoned ins premature. They're still coming out with guild hall decorations, after all, and just because the first expansion doesnt' come with one, doesn't mean there won't be one every third expansion. Remember, the old expansions didn't come out every year, so maybe Anet isn't ready to provide a full map guild hall every year.  People said fractals were abandoned, and suddenly we're getting one a year.  It's easy to keep stating everything was abandoned. Raids were abandoned, specifically because people said not enough people were doing them. So Anet added strike missions as a ramp up to raids, in hopes to increase the raiding population. It might or might not work, but they said no raids until a full set of strikes are out. 

At the end of the day, Anet moved away from one five man instanced content, to provide another five man instanced content, and so far the same can be said for 10 man instanced content. If it's not that popular, it's not that popular.  But other games have a PvE end game centered around dungeons and raids. This game isn't really like that. We didn't even have raids for the first 3.5 years. But we had people doing what they considered to be end game content, that wasn't instanced content. There's just a lot more of it now.

What I said is this game evolving, and other games, just giving you the same thing over and over. More dungeons and more raids. Well that's apparently much not better for me, because I'm not playing those games. I'm playing this game. And what I see is not abandoned stuff, but more stuff I can actually do. Raids may be abandoned, but there are 7 raids wings and I run at least a couple of them every week. Dungeons may be abandoned, but they're still in the game and  I still run them with friends sometimes. Fractals still exist, however, and they came out, get this, a couple of months after the game came out. 

I still use my guild hall every day. Recently, the gave us a way to put an item in a guild hall that allows people who haven't unlocked roller beetles to rent one, which worked very nicely for our excellent guild hall rollerbettle race track. That's new. Now when new guildies come to the guild hall, we can race with them, instead of telling them they need to buy an episode of the living world season. So maybe guild halls aren't as abandoned as you think.

We have 5-man content that's been in this game for 11 years now. Anet hasn't abandoned it. We don't have living world, but changing how you deliver content isn't the same as abandoning it. All the stuff we got form living world, (zones, stories, masteries) we're getting from the new system. All they did was change the delivery system by making it fairer for new players, and funding the game, which was too cheap for people who logged in every day anyone.

I know some people are concerned about the future of the game, but I'm kitten sure that posts like yours are the reason some of those people are concerned. No one I play with regularly however is concerned and I play with a lot of people.

Edited October 6, 2023 by Vayne.8563

[kharmin.7683]

54 minutes ago, illuminati.8453 said:

I really wish the IP would transfer to another studio, that might give us some hope for the future of GW2.  If it stays with ANet then one day we are going to wake up to a shutdown notice. 

Be very careful what you wish for.  This could happen where it gets sold off to another company who decides to try to make more profits by forcing a subscription and heavy P2W model, completely abandoning horizontal progression which would force players to continue to pay and/or grind to keep up.

Be very careful.

[Bladestrom.6425]

Just now, illuminati.8453 said:

Indeed I did enjoy that, and it clearly showed there were still in 'let's grow GW2' phase.  That phase is over. 

I don't think Anet is unique in the development fatigue that comes with MMOs.  Blizzard has experienced similar negativity with WoW, but what separates them is the response.  Blizzard will not quit, but Anet is throwing in the towel with their approach to GW2. 

For example, there are bugs that have been in the game for years and documented with clear steps to reproducing them, but ANet does nothing.  That is not a sign of a good studio, that is a sign that they do not care. 

I think your actually just a disgruntled player, time to take a break like you done last time? (and free to come back whenever you want as its GW2)  in the mean time other who enjoy will play the new content.

[illuminati.8453]

3 minutes ago, vesica tempestas.1563 said:

I think your actually just a disgruntled player, time to take a break like you done last time? (and free to come back whenever you want as its GW2)  in the mean time other who enjoy will play the new content.

I suppose, but it doesn't invalidate my opinion.  There are plenty of other people in this game that read the effort the same way I do.

I'll try to tone it down, though. 🙂

[Bladestrom.6425]

4 minutes ago, illuminati.8453 said:

I suppose, but it doesn't invalidate my opinion.  There are plenty of other people in this game that read the effort the same way I do.

I'll try to tone it down, though. 🙂

Same, in all seriousness i occasionally take a break and come back to GW2 and  it gives me hundreds f not thousands of hours of content, so they are doing something right clearly. Its a great game for that aspect at least, Just like you came back and enjoyed the return to achievements.  Try returning to WOW for example and see what a horror story that is.

Edited October 6, 2023 by vesica tempestas.1563

[azorean.1850]

SoTo is a mess?

[Assolador.3598]

1 minute ago, vesica tempestas.1563 said:

Same, in all seriousness i occasionally take a break and come back to GW2 and  it gives me hundreds f not thousands of hours of content, they are doing something right clearly, its a great game for that at least Just like you came back and enjoyed the return to achievements.  Try returning to WOW for example and see what a horror story that is.

Your ''take a break from gw2'' makes total sense, since players that see those problems are veterans playing for long time. However that's who they should take feedback off, not the tryhard raiders or casual exploration guy who didn't even got his first berserker set, veterans got all experience of all content in the game, they can read the problems of gw2 since they play it, they spend money, they love the game, that's why they are pointing those problems, otherwise they would have quitted and never looked back. These same ''problem pointing'' we do here on gw2 forums, people on wow forums do, and we both know wow is really a bad game, BUT THEY STILL LOVE THE GAME, they just want the game to be good again, to be something they like. And that's where us, as players should just quit, when players scream into the void, even tho loving the game.