Thoughts about GW3 [Merged]

[Astralporing.1957]

15 minutes ago, Fueki.4753 said:

What I meant is that Arenanet might be used as a support studio for another NCSoft game and that Arenanet's hires might have been for that project.

Yes, i got it. And again, the specific position i have mentioned is not one that is ever filled by a supporting studio. It's not a developer position, but a publisher one. And publisher role is not done by a supporting team, but by either the main studio, or the parent company.

[Zebulous.2934]

I am a bit concerned that rumors of Gw3 might kill Gw2 and that would kill Gw3 by proxy.  Why spend money on Gw2 at all when you can save up money and then spend that money on Gw3 content and cosmetics? 
It is called the Osborne effect:
  "In 1983, founder Adam Osborne pre-announced several next-generation computer models (the Osborne Executive and Osborne Vixen), which were only prototypes, highlighting the fact that they would outperform the existing model."  When his customers heard that, they mostly decided not to buy the current computer model and simply wait for the next models to be released.  Because very few clients were interested in buying the current model the company's sales revenue tanked and the Osborne Computer Corporation went bankrupt by the time it was ready to release those better computer models.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osborne_effect

Hyping up Gw3 seems to be a bad idea.

Edited June 20 by Zebulous.2934

[Cyninja.2954]

It's not something you or anyone can control. It's also something irrational to worry about currently.

There might be some other insane, huge, amazing, groundbreaking, w/e nw MMORPG which could come out and draw a lot of players.

GW3 might not even be a MMORPG for all we know.

GW3 might not even get fully developed should they pull the plug down the road (not the first MMORPG/game this happened to, not even the first for Arenanet).

GW3 should it release and should it be a MMORPG and should it be any good (it will definitely be content amount weak, far larger MMORPGs are on release) still is being developed by the same studio which develops GW2. Any assumptions about a sudden change in development quantity or quality is pretty wishful thinking.

The only thing to worry about is the quality of content coming to GW2. That's what is going to decide on how GW2 will do.

Let people hype up GW3 as much as they want, we've seen the same irrational hype with BnS, BDO, New World, T&L and who knows how many other games which had exactly 0 impact on GW2, at least significantly less than GW2s own development had.

Edited June 20 by Cyninja.2954

[Zok.4956]

11 hours ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

So, while it is entirely possible that what CFO said was inaccurate, it could only have been because he misunderstood something, not because he tried to make up things on the spot in order to get out of difficult topic. He was too senior of an executive to not know consequences of doing just that. It's also however entirely possible that he was spot on in his reveal, and it was the PR "correction" later that was inaccurate

That could all be true. But the correction (or rather clarification) was not just non-binding PR-speak and was also not allowed to contain any false statements.

11 hours ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

Notice, that, either way, Anet has been working on some UE MMORPG game for years already, and looking at the people they were hiring for that project, it was well past the early concept stages. Now, of course, we can't be sure if what was called GW3 and that project are the same thing.

Yes, that's right. We know that Anet didn't just work on GW2 in the past. They worked on at least 2 side projects and when they were stopped, around 30-40% of the developers were fired.

We also know, because it was officially stated in an analyst call, that a few years later Anet's know-how and experience was used for other NCSoft games (namely Throne and Liberty).

Of course, it makes sense for a game studio not to just focus on a 13-year-old game. It can take years from the first ideas and pre-tests to the actual start of a complete game development, or it can be stopped completely. And even if a "real", major development starts, it still takes many years until the release.  We don’t know how far Anet is on this path.

 

[Danikat.8537]

2 hours ago, Cyninja.2954 said:

It's not something you or anyone can control. It's also something irrational to worry about currently.

I agree with this.

Anet are not hyping up GW3, in fact they haven't even announced it. One NCSoft shareholder mentioned in a meeting that initial development has been approved by the publisher, but as far as I know all Anet have said is that they have an unannounced game in development, which we've known for years because they've been hiring for it. There's been no news or information other than that.

Since it's not Anet who are doing it and any 'hype' for GW3 is coming from random people online Anet have very little control over it. I suspect even if they explicitly said they are not making GW3 the people churning out click-bait content for 3rd party sites would just write articles like "ArenaNet confirms next game in the series will not be called Guild Wars 3, click here for everything we know (read: imagined) about this spiritual successor".

The best thing you can do is ignore the rumours until there's some actual information to go on, which if that shareholders update is accurate, will likely be 5+ years from now. (It might be sooner if that was a mix-up regarding the game that's already been in development for years, but if they have just recently been approved to start developing a new game, especially if it's an MMO, it's going to take years to be ready for a public announcement.)

Edited June 20 by Danikat.8537

[Astralporing.1957]

2 hours ago, Zok.4956 said:

That could all be true. But the correction (or rather clarification) was not just non-binding PR-speak and was also not allowed to contain any false statements.

No, the correction was just a press release message. And the leeway for those is nowhere as high as for the statements you make to your shareholders on shareholder meetings.

2 hours ago, Zok.4956 said:

Yes, that's right. We know that Anet didn't just work on GW2 in the past. They worked on at least 2 side projects and when they were stopped, around 30-40% of the developers were fired.

We also know, because it was officially stated in an analyst call, that a few years later Anet's know-how and experience was used for other NCSoft games (namely Throne and Liberty).

Of course, it makes sense for a game studio not to just focus on a 13-year-old game. It can take years from the first ideas and pre-tests to the actual start of a complete game development, or it can be stopped completely. And even if a "real", major development starts, it still takes many years until the release.  We don’t know how far Anet is on this path.

You might want to reread what i have actually said. We're talking about a project that has been ongoing for years, and for whom they were still hiring until very recently (specifically, until the "GW3 reveal debacle", when most of the more specific info about the projects they are hiring for was suddenly removed from their page). And a project for which they were hiring people that you don't hire if you are in early concept stages, or are doing a support work for someone else.

So, in conclusion:

1. Anet has been working for a major UE MMORPG project for years, and 3 years ago they were already at the point well past the concept stages.

That project does not seem to be just a support work for a different studio.

That project is not Throne and Liberty, nor is it Horizon MMO.

2. At some point they were actually working on converting Guild Wars assets to Unreal Engine.

3. NCSoft made a statement to their shareholders they are already working on GW3. They later tried to downplay that statement in a press release.

 

Notice, that point 1. does not mean this project is definitely Guild Wars related - it can be something else. Point 2 was not necessarily tied to that major project i have mentioned either - it might have been something else completely. Notice also, that while CFO was almost certainly speaking about what he thought to be true, he might have been exagerrating a bit, or just be confused (would not be the first time when NCSoft top executives didn't know in detail what was going on at Anet - although we must also mention that tose previous cases happened when there were significantly more degrees of separation between NCsoft and ArenaNet, and when Anet was operating way more independently). Additionally, while GW3 was mentioned, nowhere was it said that the game being spoken about was an MMORPG either.

In short, none of those things are a clear, undeniable proof that a GW3 MMORPG is being worked on. Still, taken together, they are just way too much to simply dismiss it out of hand. And in the worst case scenario it may mean the GW2 replacement is not only being worked on, but it might be not 7-10 years away but something we might see as soon as in 2-3 years.

Edited June 20 by Astralporing.1957

[Zok.4956]

37 minutes ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

1. Anet has been working for a major UE MMORPG project for years, and 3 years ago they were already at the point well past the concept stages.

That project does not seem to be just a support work for a different studio.

That project is not Throne and Liberty, nor is it Horizon MMO.

We know that Throne and Liberty, when it was still called something else, was based on a customized Guild Wars (2) engine. The only people who knew the engine were developers from Anet. So they must have worked on it or collaborated on it.

Later, because the project wasn't making enough progress, NCSoft decided to switch TuL to a different engine. That was around the time when Anet had mass layoffs. Later after the mass layoffs, Anet said (sometime in mid/late 2019) that they would only work on GW2.

Whether and when Anet actually started working on side projects again? We don't know exactly.

What we do know, however, is that Anet is working on at least two (mini) expansions for GW2 at the same time.

37 minutes ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

In short, none of those things is a clear, undeniable proof that a GW3 MMORPG is being worked on.

I can completely agree with that.

 

36 minutes ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

Still, taken together, they are just way too much to simply dismiss it out of hand.

Sure, absence of proof does not mean proof of absence. 

38 minutes ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

And in the worst case scenario it may mean the GW2 replacement is not only being worked on, but it might be not 7-10 years away but something we might see as soon as in 2-3 years.

I like GW2, but for me it would be a worst-case scenario if there was still no worthy successor in 7-10 years. Because the game keeps getting older and some parts of the game don't age very well.

 

Edited June 20 by Zok.4956

[Zerin.9834]

20 hours ago, Randulf.7614 said:

Firstly there is no such thing as GW3. It was green lit to be discussed, but not approved to for development. We don't even know what sort of game it might be - an MMO feels incredibly unlikely given the general market for them. It may not even get started or even finished if it does

Secondly. Any appearance is many years away. Prob the end of the decade. No one knows what the state of the console market will be like. Xbox is currently being obliterated with its console barely creeping over 20 million compared to what 60m for PS5 and 140m for Switch? We are a generation or two away from GW3 with no clear picture of the future of hardware

Thirdly, no amount of requesting is likely to increase whether it does or not. Such things are determined by resources, finances and whether their internal data shows it to be viable. People have asked for GW2 since day one to be on consoles. It never happened. 

I am not saying it shouldn't, but this is an early conversation for a mythical product which has already been canned at least once before in the early stages.

Well guild wars 2 probably couldn't have released on ps4, but it can with how powerful they claim ps5 to be and xbox series x.

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

28 minutes ago, Zerin.9834 said:

Well guild wars 2 probably couldn't have released on ps4, but it can with how powerful they claim ps5 to be and xbox series x.

I thought the OP was about Guild Wars 3 for consoles. 

Edit: Well now that the threads are merged...

Edited June 20 by Inculpatus cedo.9234

[Zerin.9834]

2 minutes ago, Inculpatus cedo.9234 said:

I thought the OP was about Guild Wars 3 for consoles. 

It was.

[Zera.9435]

The fact that every thread regarding any mention of the non-existent GW3 is getting merged to this mega thread to die off should tell you all that there is no GW3.

Here, I'll make it a little more clear since some people have difficulty reading:

 

THERE IS NO GW3

[Zok.4956]

13 minutes ago, Zera.9435 said:

The fact that every thread regarding any mention of the non-existent GW3 is getting merged to this mega thread to die off should tell you all that there is no GW3.

Or it could simply mean that Anet just wants the discussions about GW3 to die off.

[Nemo.6295]

On 3/28/2024 at 5:38 PM, Chiral.8915 said:

GW3 will be the MMO with world vs world as it's #1 cornerstone game mode. Praise Joko!

God I hope not. The one thing I don't like about this game is the PVP. Don't like games where you get insta-gibbed. That's not even PVP as I understand it.

As for a new game? Why? GW2 is one of the top MMOs in the industry. Why make a new game?

[Azinoth.1902]

9 hours ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

1. Anet has been working for a major UE MMORPG project for years, and 3 years ago they were already at the point well past the concept stages.

That project does not seem to be just a support work for a different studio.

That project is not Throne and Liberty, nor is it Horizon MMO.

This is a speculation, but I agree that it's not baseless. It sounds logical to assume that it could be GW3, although the "UE MMORPG" could be something else and we just confuse them due to lack of transparency.

9 hours ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

2. At some point they were actually working on converting Guild Wars assets to Unreal Engine.

The only assets they can actually convert to Unreal Engine are the 3D models (buildings, props, characters etc).
Most of the models look old already, let alone years later when GW3 is coming. There is zero reason to port those dated models other than experimenting and practicing.
It's pretty easy to do if you have the original GW2 models, you could learn how to do it from a youtube guide.

Terrain has to be recreated from complete scratch, UE has a built-in function for it, there is no way to convert GW2 terrain into it.

Foliage also has to be recreated from complete scratch, just like terrain, there are tools for mass producing and placing them. It's like a paintbrush.

So this part of the rumour doesn't mean that they are converting the actual GW2 assets into Unreal Engine for GW3.

9 hours ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

3. NCSoft made a statement to their shareholders they are already working on GW3. They later tried to downplay that statement in a press release.

I feel the same way, and this is a really bad thing for the GW2 community in general. Gem store sales and player engagement will likely drop. It also puts both Anet and NCSoft into a bad position. Treating their customers like this in 2024 while having low reputation, niche playerbase and insane competition in the market.

While I think that making an MMO sequel for a niche game is a dumb move (it could very well make Anet bankrupt), at least they should treat us like real customers and become transparent.
They already lost trust of a huge amount of players for sure.

I'd say vote with our wallets until they come out of hiding. That always worked in the case of Blizzard, when people mass unsubbed, they started to listen and be very transparent.

Edited June 20 by Azinoth.1902

[Zera.9435]

6 hours ago, Zok.4956 said:

Or it could simply mean that Anet just wants the discussions about GW3 to die off.

Yeah that's what I said. This whole thread is a blackhole for discussion about GW3 because GW3 is not a thing.

[Astralporing.1957]

8 hours ago, Zera.9435 said:

Yeah that's what I said. This whole thread is a blackhole for discussion about GW3 because GW3 is not a thing.

If it really was not a thing, don't you think they would have made a much clearer statement about it? When NCSoft mentioned expansion when GW2 was at the LS1 stage, Anet was very fast to correct that info and say they're currently not thinking about one. This time however they went "can't confirm or deny, talk to NCSoft abot that" way instead.

[Blood.7254]

On 6/19/2024 at 6:09 PM, Randulf.7614 said:

Firstly there is no such thing as GW3. It was green lit to be discussed, but not approved to for development. We don't even know what sort of game it might be - an MMO feels incredibly unlikely given the general market for them. It may not even get started or even finished if it does

Secondly. Any appearance is many years away. Prob the end of the decade. No one knows what the state of the console market will be like. Xbox is currently being obliterated with its console barely creeping over 20 million compared to what 60m for PS5 and 140m for Switch? We are a generation or two away from GW3 with no clear picture of the future of hardware

Thirdly, no amount of requesting is likely to increase whether it does or not. Such things are determined by resources, finances and whether their internal data shows it to be viable. People have asked for GW2 since day one to be on consoles. It never happened. 

I am not saying it shouldn't, but this is an early conversation for a mythical product which has already been canned at least once before in the early stages.

There's no such thing as GW3? XD Okay, buddy. Thanks for the insider information.

 

We don't know what kind of a game it would be? When ID software was making Doom 2 people were not unsure about the genre. When Bethesda was making Fallout Shelter they didn't call it Fallout 4. Guild Wars 3 means an MMO, a new title continuing GW1 and GW2.

Any appearance is many years away? This makes no real difference to a GW2 player. GW3 development means the benchwarmers get to continue on making GW2 and feed us scrappy lower quality releases. While the A team works on the new game. 6 more years of content that's progressively getting worse is a slow and agonizing death for GW2.

"Thirdly, no amount of requesting is likely to increase whether it does or not." This I agree with. Whatever happens, gw3 or the console release it's sad to see people not being able to accept that their feelings have no effect on the outcome.

[Zerin.9834]

20 hours ago, Zera.9435 said:

The fact that every thread regarding any mention of the non-existent GW3 is getting merged to this mega thread to die off should tell you all that there is no GW3.

Here, I'll make it a little more clear since some people have difficulty reading:

 

THERE IS NO GW3

Didn't they just have a share holders meeting and say they are waiting on the green light for guild wars 3?

 

[Zerin.9834]

Not everyone can buy a gaming pc and i'd like to have a gaming pc since i'm mainly a guild wars fan, but 2k is a lot of money to spend to have you people on pc just ignore me later and not have any fun with me.

 

[DeanBB.4268]

2 hours ago, Zerin.9834 said:

Not everyone can buy a gaming pc and i'd like to have a gaming pc since i'm mainly a guild wars fan, but 2k is a lot of money to spend to have you people on pc just ignore me later and not have any fun with me.

 

You certainly do not need to spend $2000 on a gaming PC to play GW2. I was running it on an AMD laptop, but got a free/retired laptop from work with a slightly better processor and video card, so use it now. I think I spent $600 on my laptop.

[Peter.3901]

On 6/20/2024 at 6:00 AM, Cyninja.2954 said:

It's not something you or anyone can control. It's also something irrational to worry about currently.

Its rational if you care about your time spent on legendaries, Gw2 is not as simple as you think, the value is the same as someone coming here and telling us that WoW 2 is in development, i lost my trust since that.

[Killthehealersffs.8940]

48 minutes ago, Peter.3901 said:

Its rational if you care about your time spent on legendaries, Gw2 is not as simple as you think, the value is the same as someone coming here and telling us that WoW 2 is in development, i lost my trust since that.

We could make Legendaries cheaper

And whoever has the  PvP + WvW  + OW lendary set (the ones thta took the longest grind)  , get some dyable "aura" effect  .

New people , by playing more ("Return to...") get thechance to unlock the Aura too .

edit: Or the effect , or  the dyable option can be unlocked in the OW , or  the WvW commander that is active and succeful  can randomly spawn Monster Hunters  monsters that when killed insta upgrade your Tower you are tryiong to capture to T3 , or an arrow with Timmer guide you into WvW various locations for step-to-step spawning monsters or in the PvP maps , the timer coinside with the spawn of the mobs and later on try to find the biggest in OW

Edited June 21 by Killthehealersffs.8940

[Astralporing.1957]

4 hours ago, Zerin.9834 said:

Didn't they just have a share holders meeting and say they are waiting on the green light for guild wars 3?

...no. And i've already explained it no more than few posts back. They've had a shareholders' meeting and said that GW3 is already being worked on. Then, after the meeting, they made a press release that downplayed that statement to "we're only considering viability".

[Magmi.6723]

On 6/20/2024 at 9:52 AM, Zebulous.2934 said:

 

I am a bit concerned that rumors of Gw3 might kill Gw2 and that would kill Gw3 by proxy.  Why spend money on Gw2 at all when you can save up money and then spend that money on Gw3 content and cosmetics

 

Because several games have been stated to follow gw3, but never launched if anything official does drop around this it will be far closer to its launch time as Anet won’t wanna make a false announcement again. 

and for the same reason, gw2 didn’t murder gw1 at its announcement, same as EQ1 to EQ2, if anything eq1 remained more popular. and every ffxiv mmorpg. 

people don’t quit spending money because a new mmorpg may come out in a decade. With this idealism no game would be worth buying in case someone launches a newer product. 

[Cyninja.2954]

1 hour ago, Peter.3901 said:

Its rational if you care about your time spent on legendaries, Gw2 is not as simple as you think, the value is the same as someone coming here and telling us that WoW 2 is in development, i lost my trust since that.

It's not something rational given you have no impact on it. You have no time frame for it. You don't even know if this event will come to pass.If you are worried about legendaries, then you are quantifying already because I can guarantee you, some time in the future this game will cease to get supported.

Legendaries are also not needed in any shape or form to enjoy this game so if you are worrying about legendaries in the context of GW3, then stop crafting them.

FYI: I am placed 50th on all legendary items on GW2efficiency (and I could easily craft the remaining 4-5 weapons I am missing to push myself into the top 30 or above with Facet of Prisms done and Eternal Forgemaster). I am not losing sleep over a potential GW3 in regards to my legendary items.

I am far more concerned with the quality and quantity of content, which is of way higher consequence in the near future.

Edited June 21 by Cyninja.2954