Please REMOVE UNSKIPPABLE dialogue. Add skip buttons back in to all NPC monologues and dialogues.

[nsinha.3601]

I understand that the base game cutscenes weren't ideal because it didn't feel as though the characters were standing next to each other and it took you out of the world, BUT we could actually read and skip through dialogue in the story. MMOs are often full of fluff, let it be a player's choice to listen to it all. When an NPC is sitting there doing nothing and giving a 5 minute monologue so my friends and I can progress the story, that's so boring! I tried to get my friends to play this game, but almost everyone stopped for these reasons. Let us skip the boring parts if we want by letting us read it at our own pace, and just let us fight monsters and watch cutscenes. The minimal cutscenes I've seen so far are LEAGUES more engaging than the NPC dialogue box. If it costs too much to do way more of that, just find a way to put a skip button on these NPCs. Maybe if you talk to them again while they are speaking, a conversation window comes up and you can say "skip" or "skip all". I like voice acting but cannot sit through so much unengaging story dialogue. I still don't know what is happening because my friends and I are so bored doing nothing and watching NPCs talk circles around each other that we tune out and aimlessly run in circles until we aren't stuck in the instance anymore. Even improving the dialogue isn't the only concern, it's the way it is presented. In summary, MORE CUTSCENES, Add SKIPPABLE DIALOGUE back to GW2 stories, and the game's pace will be back in the player's hands where it belongs in an MMO. 

[Mad Maxxie.6075]

It's painful replaying on alts. I do not understand why they couldn't at least let us choose to skip the long monologue meetings if we've played through the expansion already(I think the option to skip should be there from the start for players that don't care about the story TBH). They really need to either let us skip of make story progress account wide so we aren't forced to replay everything on alts.

 

Edit: I don't understand what is confusing. I'm trying to get my necro alt through to do some achievements I missed and the amount of times you're forced to sit through extremely long stretches of dialogue again is frustrating. I don't see how that is a hot take or confusing to anyone.

Edited September 7 by Mad Maxxie.6075
Reply to reactions

[Luthan.5236]

I know people disliked the prologue for a lot of talking and no action. But imo there are other missions in the past that felt worse - just that they also included action. But super lengthy parts at the start or in the middle. (Luckily easy optional achievements or a good replay checkpoint at most.)

The prologue can still be completed without trouble if you are able to do other stuff while running it. In the household while keeping attention to the computer. Or being alt-tabbed out. The upside is that - except maybe the part where you have to talk to the delegarts - does not need that much frequent player attention and interaction.

[Elricht Kaltwind.8796]

I absolutely loved the original NPC dialogue format and I will die on this hill. Skippable, highlighted the person talking which is what you want in a face-to-face conversation, had beautiful animations and lip sync. No idea why they ever canned it. Presumably because having NPCs talk with generic lip movements and talk emote requires a lot less work than producing those cutscenes

Edited September 5 by Elricht Kaltwind.8796

[Dark Red Killian.3946]

They already explained that they can’t add skipping to dialog because it would break the instances. Certain steps of the instance rely on dialog to trigger, etc. People don’t have to keep making these posts. This has been brought up time and time again. If you don’t want to repeat story, just don’t.

[Galran Zhadar.4305]

What often bothers me on the newer maps are the spontaneous dialogues including speech bubbles.

At first, during the initial playthrough of the map, it's really nice,but when you're on the map several times a day, it becomes really annoying. ESPECIALLY when you're moving quickly and two or more dialogues overlap, making it impossible to understand anything. OR when your own character speaks and the speech bubble blocks the view of the actual activities.

How do you see this?

[anninke.7469]

4 hours ago, Galran Zhadar.4305 said:

How do you see this?

Too much and too often.

(I'll see myself out.)

[Wladicorist.3460]

On 9/5/2024 at 2:22 AM, Elricht Kaltwind.8796 said:

I absolutely loved the original NPC dialogue format and I will die on this hill. Skippable, highlighted the person talking which is what you want in a face-to-face conversation, had beautiful animations and lip sync. No idea why they ever canned it. Presumably because having NPCs talk with generic lip movements and talk emote requires a lot less work than producing those cutscenes

 

i think youll still have the option to listen to dialogue all day long if others could just skip it ^^

Edited Tuesday at 03:23 PM by Wladicorist.3460

[Zera.9435]

On 9/4/2024 at 5:27 PM, Dark Red Killian.3946 said:

They already explained that they can’t add skipping to dialog because it would break the instances. Certain steps of the instance rely on dialog to trigger, etc. People don’t have to keep making these posts. This has been brought up time and time again. If you don’t want to repeat story, just don’t.

Then they need to change the way instances work and the triggers that occur. The stories already have some optional NPC dialogs, so they can just implement more of those.  Stoic Aldar's reminiscence of his dead wife and Vanak's museum tour, for example, should have been entirely optional.

[Skub.8240]

On 9/4/2024 at 2:27 PM, Dark Red Killian.3946 said:

They already explained that they can’t add skipping to dialog because it would break the instances. Certain steps of the instance rely on dialog to trigger, etc. People don’t have to keep making these posts. This has been brought up time and time again. If you don’t want to repeat story, just don’t.

"we designed it badly and have no interest in changing it" is not the winning defense you think it is.

[Wladicorist.3460]

18 hours ago, Zera.9435 said:

Then they need to change the way instances work and the triggers that occur. The stories already have some optional NPC dialogs, so they can just implement more of those.  Stoic Aldar's reminiscence of his dead wife and Vanak's museum tour, for example, should have been entirely optional.

do you know Dwarf Fortress? 
its a mess of Code and that being said the Devs said it wouldnt ever support multicore cpu's 
yet here we are 20 years later getting fractions of these features and it continues. 
they just should stop being lazy and rewrite the rules they've written in their code properly. until this day i cant understand how someone is still defending (not you) stuff like unskipable dialogues. i even know one guy who literally told me its a good idea... 
like how??  i mean i can read the text faster in english which is not my native language than they speak it... how is this legit?

i remember one Prince of Persia game on the xbox where i had to rewatch and relisten to the same things over and over because a boss was that hard and i was dying quite often and it reminds me of gw2 just in the present time
 

Edited Wednesday at 10:53 AM by Wladicorist.3460

[Cuks.8241]

On 9/5/2024 at 2:27 AM, Dark Red Killian.3946 said:

They already explained that they can’t add skipping to dialog because it would break the instances. Certain steps of the instance rely on dialog to trigger, etc. People don’t have to keep making these posts. This has been brought up time and time again. If you don’t want to repeat story, just don’t.

"It can't be done" is a really bad excuse.

Of course it can be done, it would just require effort. Also I'm pretty sure there were cases in the past where you could start a dialogue with NPC and it didn't lock you in - you could trigger several dialogues. Especially when it comes to side dialogues that don't really trigger anything. 

They could also do it in a completely different way. Before you enter Guild HQ a NPC would ask you if you want to participate in the Tyrian Alliance meeting. First option: Yes please. Second option: No, just debrief me on the mission and off you go.

[Solvar.7953]

Anet seems focused on milking the game for as much money as they can (I can't blame them on that - purpose of business is to make money).

While I would love for there to be skippable dialogue, I doubt that many people would make that a purchasing decision on future expansions (same for many other QoL features, like more scalable/customizable UI).  So while Anet could certainly do those things, they don't see it bringing it much money to do so, so they don't.

Where it may cause some loss of money is at this point, if a person asked me if they should start playing GW2, I would probably give them a long list of issues like this (you'll be stuck with dialogue you can't skip, or a UI designed 15 years ago when monitors were smaller and/or resolution lower, and that every other game out there does not have those issues), so it may make it more difficult to attract new players.  But those active players probably won't quit playing the game over these issues.

[The Forgotten Soul.2145]

just wanted to reply and agree. I enjoy playing different classes and thus constantly switch my main, I know there are ppl that enjoy story and love to replay story missions, but personally, I would love if every game just has an option to skip everything that's not gameplay.

but as a middle ground, at least let me skip the cutscenes and dialogues if I did the story once before on my account.

ofc I'd be more for simply getting a dialogue option like "you already completed this quest on your account, would you like to skip to the end?" but ig that would bring other issues like ppl abusing this to spam obtain certain items.

 

I would honestly also be 100% onboard with an option like "you can skip to the end, but if you do, u will not get any rewards. proceed?"

as I simply want the quests to be done on my main to keep track of what I've done, and what would be new content to me.

Edited Thursday at 04:33 PM by The Forgotten Soul.2145

[Poormany.4507]

I love it when they put checkpoints in missions for this exact reason - I do not feel like wasting my time relistening to the same exact conversations over and over to try to get one or two achievements when replaying or on alts. Wish they would put more checkpoints, more often.

Also, a checkpoint-type system for alts that says something like "One of your heroes has already completed this instance, would you like to skip it and continue the story?"

Edited yesterday at 03:05 AM by Poormany.4507

[ShatteredStars.6548]

On 9/25/2024 at 2:47 AM, Skub.8240 said:

"we designed it badly and have no interest in changing it" is not the winning defense you think it is.

your words, not theirs, they never said that.

Edited 17 hours ago by ShatteredStars.6548

[ShatteredStars.6548]

It's aways funny when someone who's not a developer just says "add this, that's all they had to do, it's not hard ", if you think it's that simple, you should go apply and do it, some players think things are so easy.

[Eloc Freidon.5692]

They stopped the animated dialogue sections that you can skip, because it took up way too much time and resources away from developing playable content. Dialogue and character movement comes from the characters themselves now. Making a version of instances where you can skip the dialogue would be recreating the same problem of taking dev time away from developing content.

[Excursion.9752]

To much talk not enough action. Not a fan, yet, of the new story. It has been a snooze fest and the fact you cant skip some of those elongated talking scenes make me die a little in side each time. Lets not forget all the achievements tied to talking to all npcs just add to the misery.  The fact that I have to sit there just to get from point A to point B in the dialog is extremely frustrating.  In my opinion they definitely missed the mark  on this expac so far. You could have had the same outcomes without those slow talking bears talking so much or having multiple meetings that could have been summed up in a in game mail.

Edited 3 hours ago by Excursion.9752