Underwhelming. Not really bad, but also not good. [Merged]

[GBEW.5947]

16 minutes ago, Zera.9435 said:

To make sure I understand: you are complaining that you got your money's worth? It was $25 for a reason. It is an expansion, just not a massive one. $25 is a good price for what we got and are getting. Sure, there are issues, but nothing that is completely unforgivable due to the low price. They're trying out a new way of delivering content to see how it plays out, how players respond, and what they can do to improve. They figure people are more ready to spend $25 than $75. All we can do is give them valid criticisms and constructive feedback where appropriate. Point out what doesn't work, point out what does, and hopefully the next expansion will be better because of it. This content is definitely NOT worth a base price of $75 or even $60, but don't forget that they totally could have done that but didn't. The pricing is on point.

no, he is complaining because there is such a massive lack of anything to do.

[Zera.9435]

1 minute ago, GBEW.5947 said:

no, he is complaining because there is such a massive lack of anything to do.

Sure, if you don't plan on making Obby armor. The expansion's selling point is the content that just so happens to have some kind of story and introduces some new characters and maps.

[GBEW.5947]

Just now, Zera.9435 said:

Sure, if you don't plan on making Obby armor. The expansion's selling point is the content that just so happens to have some kind of story and introduces some new characters and maps.

even with obby armor there is nothing to do. 

[Zera.9435]

Just now, GBEW.5947 said:

even with obby armor there is nothing to do. 

Strikes, achievement points, skin unlocks, skyscale, legendary relic. That's not nothing. If you already did ALL of that, then great. Maybe next time don't play through all the content on day one.

[Entara.3075]

As an addendum to my earlier comment post. Now that I have done the story I would add the following feedback for the newest part of the story.

The new story felt extremely short and disjointed. There were multiple times where you are told to go fill a bar by doing non-story related events on the map. To me this is not story its just something that adds time wasting filler and breaks the story up into small pieces. Kind of like those TV shows that have a commercial every 3mins.

I don't mind doing story objectives in the open world as long as they are related to the actual narrative. How does me doing rift hunting advance the story narrative?

The comments below refer to the actual story not the filler described above.

The story narrative was good and I enjoyed it despite being short. The execution was off though and felt rushed. For instance we are presented with going to war yet I am still waiting for the war and the army. I don't want to overly spoil things but Helms Deep in the Two Towers or Minas Tirith in RotK were wars. We got less than a bar brawl. More of a minor scuffle.

Length: 5/10 - 3 (Filler) = 2/10

Narrative: 7.5/10

Execution: 5/10

TLDR: Overall extremely short but mostly enjoyable. Made significantly less enjoyable due to the filler. 5/10

Edited March 1 by Entara.3075
Clarified that this is in response to the latest expac.

[SRoode.7318]

As a casual PvE player (I've averaged 1hr, 15mins a day playtime according to GW2Efficiency), it was worth the $25 for the Skyscale and Legendary Armor alone.  The rest was gravy.  And I really did enjoy the story too.

[VaegaVic.6394]

I liked:

• Nayos is extremely well rendered and designed, it does very well on capturing the "alien" feel.
• The character development & voice lines were expertly delivered (minus that 1 repetition at the beginning)
• Events were literally everywhere, making the forced filler easier to achieve
• Wizards Vault refresh was bang on, more skins more fun. 

I disliked:

• Forced filler content (complete events until so and so is ready) caused me to audibly groan. It's not fun, it leaves a bitter taste in my mouth and gives the perception you don't have respect for my time. Trying to play this content with my friends later in the year when they catch up will be awful. 
• Forced filler content again, just to emphasise it, should be relevant to my current objectives. 
• I was excited at seeing new ores (Vesperite?), bitterly disappointed when it turned out to be mithril wearing a hat. 
• "To unlock your new prof weapon, go find a scroll sitting on a rock that somehow survived millennia". It was shoehorned in and wasn't necessary. 

Other whines about SoTo in general:

• Still no new Guild Hall, which is criminal based on how beautiful SoTo is. 
• No new crafting exception essences to make bigger essences. Why can't my chef make some Kryptis nuggies? Or Kryptis sharpening stones?

What I'd like to see again:

• Drizzlewood had a great feel for adding extra maps, as it was a directional expansion. We fought through enemy lines to get to the North. I literally cannot tell you why we can't do the same in Nayos, I can now glide from East to West and I don't know why lore wise I couldn't before. This is only an issue for players playing at the time of expansion and not later however. 

Edited March 1 by VaegaVic.6394

[Tanek.5983]

11 hours ago, kiroho.4738 said:

One sentence was repeated at one NPC.

It's always interesting to see on what high level complaints about the game actually are.

I have asked myself for months now why little things like this bother me in SotO more than they have in the rest of the game. Because it isn't like there were no glitches or weirdness before this expansion. I probably noticed them at the time, but I don't think they caused as much of an impact because I was more invested in the story and other things going on.

It is like, if there is a minor annoying sound going on outside my house, my reaction to it will be very different if I'm busy having fun with friends vs if I'm already annoyed because something isn't going right. In the first case, I might hear the noise and be able to ignore it, but in the second case, I might hyper-focus on it as yet another annoyance.

Edited March 1 by Tanek.5983

[Pifil.5193]

Not a great chapter. If this is an indication of how things will be in the future then I have to say I'm not a huge fan of splitting the third map (and its story) into 3 pieces. These sections need more content, IMO.

Getting the legendary armour was good. The new weapons are fine, I suppose, somewhat anticlimactic though, arbitrarily unlocked at a random point of the story without any real reason. That's pretty standard stuff by now though, same as unlocking the Elite spec weapons or indeed the Elite Specs in previous expansions.

The first instance War Council feels like it should have been a cutscene, nothing happens. Pure exposition. All you do pick the next line of dialogue. It feels more like you're interviewing them rather than interacting in any meaningful way.

Then some "do events" filler while NPCs progress the story off screen. Do event. Arina whispers you. Do event. Arina whispers you again. It's like getting whispers from a distracted guild mate. Why does everyone just talk in my head now? Did Peitha share my "brain number" or whatever without my permission? What next? "/w Commander, buy any large wings and get a large drink for free at Bucket-o'-Wings, Divinity's Reach. Offer good this Friday only! Terms and conditions apply."

Then more "do events" filler while Ramses progresses the story. Fewer whispers this time, I guess he's busy.

Then Forced Hand. Better. At least the instance has something for you to do something while the people talk. Very short chapter though.

Then Eventide's March, again at least you have something to do while people talk although it'd be good if the general could start moving earlier.

Then the beacon stuff, OK, feels like more filler but at least it feels pertinent to the story.

Then the finale at the Coliseum, lots of talking by everyone (except you). Not exactly a thrilling way to end this short release.

So 3 short chapters starting and ending with talkathons.

The OP's title seems very appropriate for my feelings too. "Underwhelming. Not really bad, but also not good."

[Miki.3862]

Overall I really quite enjoyed the initial release, the instances were sufficiently juicy enough with content and conversations, lore insights and little hidden details.

The sad thing is I've found myself wanting to move away from this story more and more, now that we've had some time be actually experience this type of release cycle, I have to admit it's been really hard to stay invested, to the point that I only just finished the last releases story a couple days ago.

It's difficult to be invested in an enemy that feels so disconnected from everything we cared about/knew before and as others have said, all the major players being new doesn't help, I find myself wanting us to wrap this up already and have more interesting conversations with the various Astral Ward characters.

Hindsight is 20/20 and all the guff, but I think focusing on three individual interesting stories for the Astral Ward and us to investigate would have worked out better perhaps... It's impossible to say I guess, who'd have thought following on from constant world ending crisis would be difficult :p

[SolarizedRed.9254]

Sharing some feedback & thoughts of my own, since Rubi has expressed interest in it here. Hope it's useful!

• I was very excited playing through SotO's launch content! I loved exploring the tower and learning about the Wizards. The various callbacks to GW1 are very appreciated where they pop up, I'd love to see more of that in the future.
• The new gameplay content in the last few releases (convergences, new weapons, legendary armor, etc) has all been a hit in my opinion.
• I've unfortunately had a harder time getting excited about the last two story releases. I agree with Miki.3862 above, the delay in releases and a sense of disconnection with the Nayos politics undermines the tension.
• I want to continue to work with the Astral Ward in the future - Adventures and conflicts in the Mists is a great concept and I really hope that it doesn't get completely abandoned after this expansion.
• I don't want the Wayfinder to become the linchpin of the Astral Ward's plans going forward - SotO's strongest element IMO are the introduction of conflicts and complications that are bigger than the player character.
• One critique I'm sure has been heard before, but I'll repeat it here: Introducing characters just to kill them off is getting boring and predictable. It makes it hard to care about new allies or take the villains seriously.

[Kiki.9450]

5 hours ago, VaegaVic.6394 said:

Why can't my chef make some Kryptis nuggies?

"Uhh waiter? There's a menacing red eyeball in my food..." *blink*

Agreed though, I've got a surplus of essences and don't quite want to toss them out just in case something does get implemented later, but as it is right now, there's little to do with them that also isn't very expensive for me right now.

Quote

I literally cannot tell you why we can't do the same in Nayos, I can now glide from East to West and I don't know why lore wise I couldn't before. This is only an issue for players playing at the time of expansion and not later however. 

As I understood it, there was a giant wall of deadly fog blocking our entry into the west portion of the map that cleared after we defeated Heitor. Story does mention the fog once or twice I thought, though maybe it was in events instead. I definitely heard an NPC mention it though.

[VAHNeunzehnsechundsiebzig.]

3 hours ago, Kiki.9450 said:

"Uhh waiter? There's a menacing red eyeball in my food..." *blink*

 

so the usual McD quality?

[Laken.9018]

On 2/29/2024 at 7:44 PM, Cuks.8241 said:

As for the Kryptis. Now I haven't finished this chapter yet so maybe I'll change my mind but at this point I doubt it and the harm was already done. The whole ordeal with Peitha started promising. Potential ally of dubious nature, we travel to this strange demon world and get a glimpse of their game of thrones. Great setting for something interesting, new. They are kitten demons, you could do whatever. Dubious morals from our point of view, strange customs, funny or tense interactions because they are kitten demons, betrayal (I guess that one is still to be played out or not). And what we get? They (our allies) end up just another oppressed group of "people", refugees, like so many we saved in the past that needs saving by the good old Commander (Wayfinder now I guess. I don't really care how they call us). Please Commander bring some water, food and bandages to the poor Amnoon refugees... oh wait... am... poor Kryptis refugees. They just want to live the rest of their quiet lives at a farm growing Thornsprout blooms.

I think this touches on two things been bugging me about Soto and prior EOTN (but not as much).
How much god kitten asset reuse is going on now. You have all these really interesting demons and nearly all of them are reskins bar the main ones. Ramse's who's a fairly main secondary char is just a  Naga Reskin.
Then you look at most of the events and as you touched on its events we've been doing for years just applied differently. That exact same event really stood out to me as this is Demons were dealing with.

It makes the whole thing feel really cheap and like its built on skeleton staff that don't have the ability to create anything new and kind of have to tweak what came prior. Ironically  I use the phrase "its built by the interns" as it does feel like the sort of thing you'd ask a newbie to do.
"Hey use these assets we have made prior and make us an event for the new map"

[Omega.6801]

Just going to drop my two cents with a disclaimer to explain where I'm coming from.

I've been playing the game since shortly after launch and haven't taken any longer breaks since. I play mostly PvE but also play some WvW, I used to play PvP too but I haven't done so in probably three years or so. Around the time of EoD release, a bit of fatigue started to set in and I played les and less, still daily and still a lot, just less. That's fine after all those years and all those things I've done in game. But that's something I have to account for when I think about how "wow'd" I am by a new release. Also I have pretty much everything I want for my account, all the Legies, all the QoL stuff, my toons look how I want them to look and so on and so on. So it may be harder to find carrots for me when compared to a player that started two years ago and doesn't have all those things.

Now here we go, SotO 3 "The Realm of Dreams"
1) The Good:
- The new third of the map is visually more interesting than the first. There's more diverse stuff going on.
- Also the events seem to offer more variety.
- I also like the meta more than on the first third of Inner Nayos.
- Finally getting the Legendary Relic.
- New Weapons seem fun, although I haven't tested them all.
- Always good to see skins as rewards.

2) The Bad:
- The new Mastery offers nothing when not going for the Legendary armor.
- Still no sink for Essences when not going for Legendary armor.
- Story instances feel empty, especially when we're supposed to fight an epic battle.
- Uninspired achievements for the new weapons. "Kill 1000 Enemies" just isn't very fun.

3) The Ugly:
- No new Relics and the Relic system as a whole. Still waiting on that communication when those core Relics are supposed to be released, especially in a world where we have "expansion" releases every 3 months.
- The 3 month cadence just doesn't klick for me. It's been nine months now and I really wanted to give this new model a fair try, and I think I did. But instead of having: a big release, six months of drought then living season for 18 months, then another drought of six months followed by the next big release; it feels like we have a very small release, two months of drought that feel like six, then the next very small release. SotO 1 started out very promising, I really liked the first two maps and all the wizard stuff but with SotO 2 it kinda came to a screeching halt and this release sadly continued this trend. The release feels small. One reason for this may be...
- There's not a lot to go for outside of the Legendary armor. I Know it's a big draw for many players. And for thse players, it's a big goal that will take a while, as it should, it's a Legendary armor after all. But for me, a player who will not craft it, it's not a goal, so I won't go for it and since so much in SotO seems to be laser focused on the legendary journey, it seems "not for me". A few other long term goals would have been nice.
- Story filler bits. We improved, I have to admit. We are not asked 4 times to close rifts anymore. But asking us to view three vistas is probably the laziest I've seen in this game. I mean repurposing Hero Points or "Do events until the bar is full" is at least a bit engaging and has some action to it.
- I don't understans why we get chests with the wobbly tentacle weapons for the uninspired new weapon achivements. Better than nothing, some of them are worth a few gold. But a new skin matching the weapon, something like we used to get with the old Elite Spec collection achis would have ben great.

Anyway, so much for my two cents. Have a nice day.

[Cuks.8241]

22 hours ago, Zera.9435 said:

To make sure I understand: you are complaining that you got your money's worth? It was $25 for a reason. It is an expansion, just not a massive one. $25 is a good price for what we got and are getting. Sure, there are issues, but nothing that is completely unforgivable due to the low price. They're trying out a new way of delivering content to see how it plays out, how players respond, and what they can do to improve. They figure people are more ready to spend $25 than $75. All we can do is give them valid criticisms and constructive feedback where appropriate. Point out what doesn't work, point out what does, and hopefully the next expansion will be better because of it. This content is definitely NOT worth a base price of $75 or even $60, but don't forget that they totally could have done that but didn't. The pricing is on point.

Gw2 is worth it's money. It's actually undervalued for the amount of time I spend in it. I pay more than 25eur for 2 days of groceries. It's a good and cheap game. But I value my free time, the part I spend in gw2, more than 25 eur per year. Much more. Do I really want to play a cheap game in that free time? 

Now this is completely my personal situation. Give me a full expansion, Hot or Pof quality, price it a 60 eur. Hey price it higher, fine, inflation whatever. But produce an expansion worth it's name. And I'll pay and play it. 

But again, this is my personal situation. If it's a good business model for Anet, fine, good for them. I have no data to say otherwise and they probably have. I would just like more good content, especially outside of just ow pve and I'm willing to pay for it. 

It's actually sad. I've bought a few full priced games in the last year and I barely played them. I gave more money to these shoddy "AAA" games than to Anet for gw2 which I still consider one the best games ever.

[Chocofox.9503]

I mean this 'War' feels very underwhelming. I'd expect to see at least someone of the ward actively trying to get rid of all kryptis with their biased. The fight feels very one sided with little actual impact. 

I think the best way to put it would be

"This is not war, This is pest control."

[Knighthonor.4061]

whats yall thoughts on the story?

[Urud.4925]

I agree with most of the OP's feedback.

I don't like the whole concept of helping a stranger to plan a coup, just because she asked us first. We didn't even know who was the king and what he did, at the beginning of the story. But yeah, let's trust Peitha, she doesn't seem manipulative at all.

We have to prove ourselves and convince the Kryptis to trust us. Why? They should convince me to fight for them. If they prefer to serve under Eparc, good for them, it's not my business to convince them to kill their king.

Last part of the episode in particular was quite underwhelming. We assaulted the queen's palace in three. 3 versus 1. For a queen, I expected some better defence. And this is even more awkward when Eparc says "gather your army". We are... four! But strong! That recital at the colisseum was also very anti-climax: the Queen gets free from the chains, and what does she do? She kill herself, instead of fighting us in 2 vs 3. Eparc is raged, becomes more powerful, and what does he do? He leaves, instead of just killing 3 people. Then when we ask the General why he left, I would like to say "because he must wait 3 months", but unfortunately I can't tell the Commander the truth.

Also, as the OP said, there is no reason to call us Wayfinder, it sounds a mockery. We are the most clueless person there, we even say that we still don't know how things work there, but we are at Dagda's disposal. A "way finder" is supposed to be someone able to see a path ahead, before the others, and then guide them through. But we just follow what other people tell us or ask to do. Because we know nothing. We just help with chores ("Wayfinder, glad to see you, use your skyscale to kill those turrets", "Wayfinder, fetch those astral ward supplies". "escort this team"). I understand that we play an MMO, and we are supposed to do chores, but don't call us wayfinder if we are the last peasant of Nayos. Call us... "Jo".

Now imagine Frodo saying:

- "Commander, kill that octopus". - Hey, I'm the Commander, I should give orders.

- "Wayfinder, kill that octopus!" - I'm the way-finder, I decide our next move. You follow me.

- "Jo, kill that octopus!" - ...  Okay

See? Easier. Nothing to complain, it's even a genderless nickname, short. And it reminds us that in the end we are just the average Jo(e). Petition.

[xDumplinx.7983]

story was ok, but had a weak uninspired ending with the laziest writing I have seen since IBS.  The zone is good, with plenty to do. already have 3 weights of legendary armor so open world set isn't an issue. all in all, not a terrible living world... oops i mean expansion update, with story and massive amounts of (obviously QC department have no staff) bugs that shouldn't exist in a live server dragging it down.

[GBEW.5947]

12 hours ago, Urud.4925 said:

don't call us wayfinder if we are the last peasant of Nayos. Call us... "Jo".

"hey, uhh jo! go kill these turrets already ya dumby!"

That's definitely more how it feels thank you for this laugh. 

[Braynz.2906]

We still have the speech bubbles in LOS - just move them or get rid of them altogether

Edited March 3 by Braynz.2906

[SilasLews.6790]

When Peitha first made a dig about the Commander not liking that people weren't worshipping the ground they walk on, I was like "since when did the Commander become such an arrogant self-absorbed a**hole?" Now I realize--this was a dig at the playerbase.

The Commander has been dropped into a situation where they are completely out of their depth, more so than ever before. Everyone around them is more knowledgeable and more experienced, and many of them are hundreds of years older and have seen conflicts on a greater scale than the Commander has.

Even so, the Commander has been bestowed with a title that has repeatedly been expressed to have great meaning and significance.

If, in the face of it all, your Commander still thinks everyone should defer to them, and thinks they're above the title of Wayfinder just because they're so far up their own a** that they can't see the big picture, well.... they aren't much of a hero after all.

I'm also underwhelmed by the story right now, but one thing I'm hoping is for the Commander to remain small in the face of grander conflicts. It's refreshing, and frankly it seems like the Commander in general could use the dose of humble pie.

Edited March 3 by SilasLews.6790

[Ashen.2907]

58 minutes ago, SilasLews.6790 said:

When Peitha first made a dig about the Commander not liking that people weren't worshipping the ground they walk on, I was like "since when did the Commander become such an arrogant self-absorbed a**hole?" Now I realize--this was a dig at the playerbase.

The Commander has been dropped into a situation where they are completely out of their depth, more so than ever before. Everyone around them is more knowledgeable and more experienced, and many of them are hundreds of years older and have seen conflicts on a greater scale than the Commander has.

Even so, the Commander has been bestowed with a title that has repeatedly been expressed to have great meaning and significance.

If, in the face of it all, your Commander still thinks everyone should defer to them, and thinks they're above the title of Wayfinder just because they're so far up their own a** that they can't see the big picture, well.... they aren't much of a hero after all.

I'm also underwhelmed by the story right now, but one thing I'm hoping is for the Commander to remain small in the face of grander conflicts. It's refreshing, and frankly it seems like the Commander in general could use the dose of humble pie.

How do you balance that point of view with the fact that all of those much older, experienced, etc characters cannot handle their own problems and need the commander to come in and save them (while they contribute little to the effort).

As to conflicts on a greater scale, like what? The commander has fought elder dragons, a god, and so on. Nothing we've seen from the characters in SotO indicates that they've faced worse, or could have done much against what the commander has left dead in his/her wake.

And, to be clear, I would have preferred a more down to earth, gritty, approach to the commander's adventures where there might be a bit less to justify an ego the size of a planet but ANet decided to put the commander on scale with gods and elder dragons.

[Silesium.5623]

This is only my opinion not putting all staff that was added with exp just what I see for my self.
Pros:
+New Weapons for each class (prefer specialization)
+Interesting maps
+Daily system update
+Wizard Vault
+Runa/Relic split for more diversity
+New Skins
Cons
-Wait time for next part/updata
-Re-used aset (will be amazing if kriptis had there fresh new desing insted using old mobs with reskins)
-Missing Specialization (bigest selling point for me)
-Story (Feels some times that big stiudio like anet have three people who was working on the game. Enter mission > go from A to B > kill few weak mobs > listen to npcs)
-New weapon design/balance (We diden't get specialization, but somehow one class get overpower weapon other get dry stick. For example Renger mace/mace vs Mesmer rifle how do you comepear that).
Suggestion
= Add to rift 1/10 used cubes the more people use there cubes the bigger reword they will get = less runing around map
= Remove selection pvp/pve/wvw from daily vault make limit of daily 0/6 so people have way more option to do there daily without limitation