Whats next..!? more of the same !?

[mercury ranique.2170]

9 minutes ago, Krajtin.8956 said:

This new model exists now because they are actively developing their new "unannounced" project in Unreal 5. When this project is at 80-90% of development (when they develop the last mini-expansion), perhaps they will return to the real expansions (as long as not another game and not GW3).

All this quality of SoTo is mainly due to the amount they are dedicating to this new project. It's almost exactly the same as IBS, only this time ALL players pay for this content.

We don't have new specializations, not because they are difficult to balance, but because the creativity part is in the other project. And this applies to all SoTo features.

Unfortunately we will have to wait until 2025-2026 to know the future of GW2. It's sad

IBS was free and not a paid expansion.
I see a lot of people happy with the change and a lot of people unhappy. It is the essence of change. Some like it. Some do not. Do you prefer to have a big clunk of content once every 4-5 years or do you prefer to have smaller clunks every year? There is no good or bad here.
So in short.
Do not complain that the content is low compared to other games.
If you do not like the content, do not buy it. If you dislike the change, do not buy it.

ps. Pro-tip. Propably in 4-5 years you can buy a Soto, and the next 3-4 yearly expansion with a great discount. You can also recieve a huge blob of content in one purchase, just like it was before.

[Zok.4956]

11 hours ago, Obtena.7952 said:

Well, that makes sense if you exclude all the options that are worse, like where the game just doesn't exist because the expansion business model was no longer working.

Well, we know that Anet wanted a more streamlined regular revenue, but we don't know, if the expansion business model was no longer working.

 

11 hours ago, Obtena.7952 said:

This kind of question missed the point of the change to the business model in the first place.

Well, we don't know all the reasons why Anet changed their busines model ... again. 

 

11 hours ago, Obtena.7952 said:

Like somehow Anet randomly makes these changes for no reason.

Anet did randomly(*) make changes to their business model.    (*) randomly in the sense of how it looks from the outside.

• First it was: B2P (buy the game) with gem shop and free living world and NO EXPANSIONS, NEVER.
• Then it changed to:  "paid expansions" with seperate paid living world (LW episodes only free if you login in during a small time period) (that was HoT/LW3 and PoF/LW4).
• Then it changed to: NO EXPANSIONS, but an expansion worthy big season with expansion features that was therefore called a "saga" (that was the Ice Brood Saga).
• Then (a few months later) it changed to: The work on the IBS was scrapped and there will be a paid expansion (that was EOD).
• Then it changed to: No Living World anymore.  However, I can't remember if this change (no Living World Season with Cantha after EoD) already was announced before the SotO accouncement.
• Then it changed to: Yearly pre-paid Mini-Expansions where you get some content at release and the rest of the already paid-for content during 12 months (that is SotO).

This back and forth of their monetization model actually looks erratic and somewhat random from the outside.

I'm pretty sure the managers who made these decisions always thought there were good and important reasons for them. But I'm also pretty sure that due to the staff turnover at Anet, it wasn't the same managers and different managers have different opinions about what's right and wrong and what goals the company should specifically pursue.

11 hours ago, Mistwraithe.3106 said:

is here to stay as it's the best economic model Anet have come up with

I think that sentence is true. But I guess it was also true in the past before Anet made all those changes in their  economic model. 😉

I think if it works (which means there a a lot of customers who like it and pay money for it) it will stay. And if it not works or there are changes in management it maybe will  not stay.  

The real test of this new model will be the sales of the next expansion.

Edited March 5 by Zok.4956

[Krajtin.8956]

15 minutes ago, mercury ranique.2170 said:

IBS was free and not a paid expansion.

For active players. I had to buy 3/4 of IBS with real money because I started at the end of 2019.

PD:  I bought SoTo because for me €25 on a video game is little every year. I also bought LW2-LW3-LW4

Edited March 5 by Krajtin.8956

[Zok.4956]

18 minutes ago, mercury ranique.2170 said:

Do not complain that the content is low compared to other games.
If you do not like the content, do not buy it. If you dislike the change, do not buy it.

You are not the gatekeeper for whether paying customers are allowed to comment on the quality and quantity of a product or not.

[Zok.4956]

On 2/28/2024 at 11:45 PM, Zaklex.6308 said:

I'll tell you the problem with why maybe older players don't like the new content, it's because of CHANGE, they don't like the change.

You assume made-up motivations and reasons and then argue against them. I think that's called a strawman. 

Edited March 5 by Zok.4956

[kharmin.7683]

On 2/28/2024 at 5:45 PM, Zaklex.6308 said:

I'll tell you the problem with why maybe older players don't like the new content, it's because of CHANGE, they don't like the change.  They go back to the old maps because they're familiar and they don't have to learn new ways to play, they are set in their ways and do not want to expand their thinking...that is the problem, the same problem you have with everything: NO ONE LIKES CHANGE, get used to change because it is here to stay.  Nothing can stay the same and survive, that is just the way of it.

As an older player, this does not apply to me with regards to SotO.  For me, there just isn't enough there to reward me for spending my time in those maps.  I have no interest in legendary anything which seems to me to be the major point of this expansion.

As for learning new ways to play, having worked my way through all maps from core to present, I don't see any radical changes to game-play that would make your observation make sense.  I'd wager that many other older players would feel the same way.

[Zok.4956]

11 hours ago, Mistwraithe.3106 said:

Or is it really that everything around that period, inc LWS3/4, is better?

Of course not. HoT/LWS3/PoF/LWS4 had also a lot of problems/bugs/... 

And there was (also) a content drought in the past because Anet not only worked on GW2 but also on unannounced side-projects. Something that was suspected by players at the time and for which there was (indirect) confirmation only afterwards.

Anet increased the difficulty curve in HoT too much (I had fun, but many players left the game because of it), HoT almost killed WvW with the Desert Borderland map at the time. etc. etc.

HoT was released in October 2015, PoF about two years later in September 2017. Between HoT and PoF there was also the S3. And S4 was released 2 months after PoF release in November 2017, so some work was already done on it before the PoF release.

This is a very inaccurate comparison, but if I take the content from S3 and PoF, i.e. the content (everything, not just the story) that was released in the two years after HoT, and take half of it, it seems to me to be a long way from what we have gotten so far with SotO and will probably still get (according to announcements).

For me, it's not just the quantity that matters, but also the creative ideas that are realized, including really new things that haven't existed before. HoT/S3/PoF/S4 have changed and improved so many things, including fundamental things that all further expansions are based on.

Mike O'Brien (former president and co-founder of Anet) once said that many ideas that were being worked on internally did not make it to release and work on them was stopped because Anet decided at some point during development that it wasn't good enough or wouldn't work as intended.

Since EoD, I have the feeling (I can't prove it scientifically) that some of these old unpublished ideas were rehashed and published because there were no good new ideas left.

There are a lot of things at SotO that I enjoy. But I still have the feeling that with SotO the safe path was taken much more without any real innovations or experiments.

 

[mercury ranique.2170]

1 hour ago, Zok.4956 said:

You are not the gatekeeper for whether paying customers are allowed to comment on the quality and quantity of a product or not.

And nowhere do I claim I am. I'm simply stating the only real instrument people have to show their support or dislike. It is the real power of commerce. To buy or not buy a product.

[Astralporing.1957]

1 hour ago, mercury ranique.2170 said:

And nowhere do I claim I am. I'm simply stating the only real instrument people have to show their support or dislike. It is the real power of commerce. To buy or not buy a product.

It's however a nuclear option. By using that power, you lose any chance the game might get better for you ever again.

If people that like X all quit the game, because X is not done well enough, then the game producer will have even less reason to support X - after all, most people that liked it have quit already. And, of course, if enough players leave the game to cause a big enough impact, the danger is that game just shuts down (and, again, nothing will get fixed).

It's this conundrum that Anet is counting on when they cheapen the quality of the delivered content. Of course, at some point they will overreach, but most likely by that time it will be way too late to fix things.

Especially if some players will try prevent/stifle any complains and advocate the ones  raising them that if they don't like the direction where the game is going, they should just shut up and quit silently.

[Obtena.7952]

5 hours ago, Zok.4956 said:

Well, we know that Anet wanted a more streamlined regular revenue, but we don't know, if the expansion business model was no longer working.

 

Well, we don't know all the reasons why Anet changed their busines model ... again. 

 

Anet did randomly(*) make changes to their business model.    (*) randomly in the sense of how it looks from the outside.

• First it was: B2P (buy the game) with gem shop and free living world and NO EXPANSIONS, NEVER.
• Then it changed to:  "paid expansions" with seperate paid living world (LW episodes only free if you login in during a small time period) (that was HoT/LW3 and PoF/LW4).
• Then it changed to: NO EXPANSIONS, but an expansion worthy big season with expansion features that was therefore called a "saga" (that was the Ice Brood Saga).
• Then (a few months later) it changed to: The work on the IBS was scrapped and there will be a paid expansion (that was EOD).
• Then it changed to: No Living World anymore.  However, I can't remember if this change (no Living World Season with Cantha after EoD) already was announced before the SotO accouncement.
• Then it changed to: Yearly pre-paid Mini-Expansions where you get some content at release and the rest of the already paid-for content during 12 months (that is SotO).

This back and forth of their monetization model actually looks erratic and somewhat random from the outside.

I'm pretty sure the managers who made these decisions always thought there were good and important reasons for them. But I'm also pretty sure that due to the staff turnover at Anet, it wasn't the same managers and different managers have different opinions about what's right and wrong and what goals the company should specifically pursue.

I think that sentence is true. But I guess it was also true in the past before Anet made all those changes in their  economic model. 😉

I think if it works (which means there a a lot of customers who like it and pay money for it) it will stay. And if it not works or there are changes in management it maybe will  not stay.  

The real test of this new model will be the sales of the next expansion.

The fact is that people are TRYING to make it sound like there was no good reason for Anet to change the model, pretending like Anet just wanted to deliver a worse experience to them for frivolity.  True we don't know the reasons but ... they are there, whatever they are and people shouldn't assume they weren't fundamental to Anet's ability to provide the game as a service. 

Also, The claims about the 'randomness' of the business model don't make sense. Until now, the model has ALWAYS been ... you buy expansions, which are VERY similar in content and there is content rolled out in between linked to the purchase of the expansion, also very similar in style between expansions. Also, you can purchase content from the GS. These things haven't changed until the expansions last year. 

Edited March 5 by Obtena.7952

[Astralporing.1957]

41 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

The fact is that people are TRYING to make it sound like there was no good reason for Anet to change the model, pretending like Anet just wanted to deliver a worse experience to them for frivolity. 

For frivolity? No. The claim is that the change has nothing to do with delivering good GW2 experience, and all to do with Anet wanting to use resources elsewhere and thinking it's fine to downsize GW2 staff, and deliver less (and worse quality) content, because they will still have a ton of players defending them and trying to present the situatiuon in a good light.

There's no business in the world that would not consider lowering the resources spent on their products, even at a cost to quality of their services/merchandize, if only they'd think they can get away with it. And by trying to defend their behaviour, we are letting them get away with it.

[Obtena.7952]

6 minutes ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

For frivolity? No. The claim is that the change has nothing to do with delivering good GW2 experience, and all to do with Anet wanting to use resources elsewhere and thinking it's fine to downsize GW2 staff, and deliver less (and worse quality) content, because they will still have a ton of players defending them and trying to present the situatiuon in a good light.

Well, you can claim that if you like but you shouldn't convince yourself it's true. The fact is that if it's worth it to you or anyone else has nothing to do with how the decision to make the change was made. 

6 minutes ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

There's no business in the world that would not consider lowering the resources spent on their products, even at a cost to quality of their services/merchandize, if only they'd think they can get away with it. And by trying to defend their behaviour, we are letting them get away with it.

EXACTLY ... which means there are REASONS Anet made the hard decision to change the business model if they knew that some people would regard that as a degradation in service. Except the thing you are wrong ... they don't get away with it. It DOES affect them. They KNOW that. They made that decision ANYWAYS. 

The idea that Anet was trying to sneak something past people and get away with it is absolute nonsense. The change to the model is obvious to customers here. No one is being 'taken' by something  nefarious here. 

Edited March 5 by Obtena.7952

[Astralporing.1957]

Just now, Obtena.7952 said:

EXACTLY ... which means there are REASONS Anet made the hard decision to change the business model if they knew that some people would regard that as a degradation in service. Except the thing you are wrong ... they don't get away with it. It DOES affect them. They KNOW that. They made that decision ANYWAYS. 

Yes, they have reasons. That does not mean i (or you, or any other GW2 player) should be defending those reasons, because they are all about Anet's profit at our expense and at a cost to game's quality.

I expect them to deliver a good game. If they cannot, or do not want to, then, regardless of their reasons i will keep caling them on that. That's because i am not being paid by anet to be thinking about their profits more than i think about my enjoyment of the game. Are you?

[Obtena.7952]

12 minutes ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

Yes, they have reasons. That does not mean i (or you, or any other GW2 player) should be defending those reasons, because they are all about Anet's profit at our expense and at a cost to game's quality.

Why not? That doesn't make sense to say those decisions shouldn't be defended if the result is that Anet can still provide a level of service that is worth it for the people that play it. You just don't want people to defend because you don't like it. Also, it doesn't need to be defended. Anet is in charge here. 

12 minutes ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

I expect them to deliver a good game. If they cannot, or do not want to, then, regardless of their reasons i will keep caling them on that. That's because i am not being paid by anet to be thinking about their profits more than i think about my enjoyment of the game. Are you?

Sure ... except that's not determined by their sole measure of if it's a good game according to you. Look I get you don't like how the game has progressed, but it's not about you. All that you can do is ask yourself if playing the game is worth your own time and money. If it's not, then don't. Anet simply isn't going to deliver a game based on your standard of what is good.

Bottomline: Anet's decisions to change the game business model has nothing to do with how you feel about it. 

Edited March 5 by Obtena.7952

[Astralporing.1957]

4 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

Why not? That doesn't make sense to say those decisions shouldn't be defended if the result is that Anet can still provide a level of service that is worth it for the people that play it. How is that measured? Certainly not by polling angry individuals on the forums. 

Sure ... except that's not determined by their sole measure of if it's a good game according to you. Look I get you don't like how the game has progressed, but it's not about you. All that you can do is ask yourself if playing the game is worth your own time and money. If it's not, then don't. Anet simply isn't going to deliver a game that meets your standard, unless you are going to SIGNIFICANTLY fund the game out of your own pocket by being a majority stakeholder. 

Bottomline: If you want the game to be about you, sounds like you need to pruchase Anet outright and tell them how to make the game. Otherwise, you 'share' it with the rest of us and deal with the parts you don't like just like everyone else. 

Do you have any data on this? Because from what i can see, they are lowering quality not because they have to, but simply because they can. And they can because people like you defend them, and try to pretend as if nothing bad is happening when it clearly does.

Anyway, in the end, for whatever reason, Anet is delivering now lower quality content, and no amount of defending their reasons to do so is going to change that fundamental fact. The game is currently in a far worse state quality wise than it was before. And i do not need to care about why it's so. And btw, defending them your way is pointless - if they indeed are now in so bad shape that they just cannot deliver content on the level we were used to, that is in itself bad news. Defending bad news with another bad news doesn't make anything better.

[Obtena.7952]

14 minutes ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

Do you have any data on this? Because from what i can see, they are lowering quality not because they have to, but simply because they can. And they can because people like you defend them, and try to pretend as if nothing bad is happening when it clearly does.

That's the problem with what you are saying. The question isn't about quality, it's about value ... and whether the game is 'lower quality' is a subjective assessment. You simply don't speak for everyone about the quality of the game. 

You feel you get less quality? OK ... you also get to determine if you want to pay for that lower quality in more frequent and smaller amounts. That's where some of the value comes in. Again, if content doesn't have value to you, you don't have to buy it. Anet isn't 'sneaking' anything past you for whatever nefarious reasons you think they can. That's just some bad acting narrative painting Anet as some villain because you are bitter about not getting expansions. 

 

 

Edited March 5 by Obtena.7952

[Wielder Of Magic.3950]

9 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

because you are bitter about not getting expansions. 

Thank you for admitting we should not classify SoTO as an expansion.

[Obtena.7952]

8 minutes ago, Wielder Of Magic.3950 said:

Thank you for admitting we should not classify SoTO as an expansion.

I made no "admission" as to how I label SoTo so ... 🤡

The absurd thing is that this kind of comment shows how bad people miss the point. The discussion here isn't about how you label the content because whether it's an 'expansion' or not is irrelevant. It's about the value it delivers you for the price Anet charges for it.

I mean, SOMEHOW people forgot how buying stuff works. Whether something has value to you is a YOU decision, not some general assessment the general population makes for you. Whether Anet can make a business out of GW2 selling content depends on WAY more factors than if they are making 'expansions' or not. 

Edited March 5 by Obtena.7952

[Zok.4956]

48 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

 but it's not about you.

But it actually is. And about you. And about me. And about all other actual and possible new customers. Because Anet lives from customers spending money on the game.

 

52 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

Bottomline: Anet's decisions to change the game business model has nothing to do with how you feel about it. 

Well, it's a feedback loop where the vote (and money) of one customer is completely unimportant to Anet, but the vote/money of many is not. 

 

[Ashen.2907]

Who claimed that ANet is sneaking anything past us? The lessening of the game releases have been quite up front.

[Sobx.1758]

1 hour ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

Do you have any data on this? Because from what i can see, they are lowering quality not because they have to, but simply because they can.

Well... do you have any data on this?

Edited March 5 by Sobx.1758

[Obtena.7952]

56 minutes ago, Zok.4956 said:

But it actually is. And about you. And about me. And about all other actual and possible new customers. Because Anet lives from customers spending money on the game.

 

Well, it's a feedback loop where the vote (and money) of one customer is completely unimportant to Anet, but the vote/money of many is not. 

 

No, it's not about me or you or any individual. It's about EVERYONE. So when people make general claims that the quality of the content is decreasing, that's THEIR assessment. They don't speak for anyone else. So what those people making those claims need to do is stop pretending like how they feel and their subjective opinions are related to general truths about how everyone feels about the game and therefore ... Anet is doing things wrong or bad. 

Again, if the game was about ME ... Anet would be coming to ME and asking ME what I wanted and making the game how I want. That's not happening. That can't happen. Service-providing businesses that require large numbers of people to be successful just don't work that way. 

You already know how this works. The money talks. If people are GENERALLY not seeing the value in the content, they will not buy the content. If they are, they will. If enough people do buy it, it will work as a business. That's what matters. Anet does not care if some particular player does or does not buy something. That factors in EXACTLY ZERO to their decisions on how the game changes or the content they offer. 

 

Edited March 5 by Obtena.7952

[Astralporing.1957]

12 minutes ago, Sobx.1758 said:

Well... do you have any data on this?

Well, all i see is quality dropping and content delivery getting reduced at the time where game income des not seem to be dropping down significantly. I see also far less resources available for the game than during times with similar income before. I also know how they behaved during late LS4 and IBS, and why I also know that they're doing (again) some other projects behind the screen, and the resources for those projects need to come from somewhere.

Honestly, at this point it's not hard to connect the dots.

[Obtena.7952]

51 minutes ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

Well, all i see ...

OK so to answer their question ... NO, you don't have the data either, yet you make the claims about Anet offering lower quality content because they 'can', implying they are 'sneaking' something by us to take advantage of people for some nefarious reasons ... since you 'see' things.

The problem is that you to create the narrative that fits your beliefs based on the things you see. Except you ignore things you can't see (or don't want to see) that don't fit that narrative. That's how conspiracy theory works. 

I really don't get this mentality. I'm not going to debate if you like the content or not, but no one should be pretending that how they feel or their subjective opinions about content should be some indicator to Anet about the quality of that content or the value it brings to players. 

 

 

Edited March 5 by Obtena.7952

[kharmin.7683]

Ironically, Obtena and Astralporting arguing is on topic of  "more of the same"  🙄