Can we get some clarification about War Eternal?

[robertthebard.8150]

@AlexxxDelta.1806 said:

@"zealex.9410" said:Also, can we take a second just to admire the microtransaction roadmap? Pretty competent work considering we've been asking for a content roadmap for years and recieved nothing.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/ancient-rituals-and-valuable-supplies-in-the-gem-store/

I did admire it and it's not the first time either. It seems there is a team who manages to pump out content on the regular, release detailed roadmaps and stick to schedule. It just happens to be the mtx team.

You mean the team that doesn't have to do area works/reworks, write associated stories, assemble scripts and voice actors, and then put it all together and hopefully test it out to make sure it works? It's a hell of a lot easier to design cosmetics and other stuff for the cash shop, because those items don't have to have a lot of other stuff done to go with it. The more you know...

[AlexxxDelta.1806]

@robertthebard.8150 said:

@AlexxxDelta.1806 said:

@"zealex.9410" said:Also, can we take a second just to admire the microtransaction roadmap? Pretty competent work considering we've been asking for a content roadmap for years and recieved nothing.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/ancient-rituals-and-valuable-supplies-in-the-gem-store/

I did admire it and it's not the first time either. It seems there is a team who manages to pump out content on the regular, release detailed roadmaps and stick to schedule. It just happens to be the mtx team.

You mean the team that doesn't have to do area works/reworks, write associated stories, assemble scripts and voice actors, and then put it all together and hopefully test it out to make sure it works? It's a hell of a lot easier to design cosmetics and other stuff for the cash shop, because those items don't have to have a lot of other stuff done to go with it. The more you know...

Your point? Where exactly, in that quote, did I comment on the complexity of the task?

Since you mentioned it though, there are plenty of teams, in many studios, who do all the things you described and yet manage to provide a release schedule and mostly stick to it. Anet and GW2 pre LS4 included.

[Glider.5792]

@"cptaylor.2670" said:

@"Dragon Priestess.9760" said:I'd rather have a full and well polished product than a rushed and unfinished one. I don't care how long it takes.

I just can't understand why people would rather have content hastily rushed out the door in sacrifice of quality. Game development takes time.

Well, doubt, mostly. Kourna took substantially longer, and for most of the release day you still couldn't even hardly get into the map without crashing. On top of the various other issues with it. So, it's doubt that more time doesn't necessarily mean better quality. It just means, more time.

And there will always be unforeseen issues at release. No amount of extra time is going to guarantee that all of those will be resolved beforehand.

It's also just disappointment that, as many suspected, this welcome back series was going to be a prelude jumping into the next episode. But, given that Caithe's requiem hasn't been released, I kind of figured they were postponing for much longer than the 30th that people were anticipating.

Given that the package lasts 4 weeks, ending on.. May 14th? I wouldn't be surprised to see a trailer the 21st, and the episode on the 29th of May at the earliest.

Next patch is supposed to hit in 3 weeks. That week is going to give the final item of the package. It might be that we get a trailer on 7th of May, and final item and EP6 releases on 14th. You would get the last package as the episode would hit, so it would still counts as "preperation".

[Healix.5819]

@"Linken.6345" said:Dident they use to have 4 teams?

After HoT, they split into 4 teams. 3 of those teams were dedicated to the living world, each working on their own episode, while the fourth team was dedicated to creating expansions. The 3 living world teams are still in order, so team 1 has been episode 1 and 4 for example.

[FrizzFreston.5290]

i thought the two three month thing was more of a ideal goal than a "this is when we will release new episodes at any given time!" Guaranteed!

[Bast.7253]

@"FrizzFreston.5290" said:i thought the two three month thing was more of a ideal goal than a "this is when we will release new episodes at any given time!" Guaranteed!

It’s the old ideal cadence, but it’s pretty clear this season is 3 to 4 months best case, with the occasional 5. Might be quicker next season when they have more people to put in the episodes. Or they might reconsider their format as they discussed and do maps in chunks. Not sure how that will work though with the addition of mounts.

[robertthebard.8150]

@AlexxxDelta.1806 said:

@robertthebard.8150 said:

@AlexxxDelta.1806 said:

@"zealex.9410" said:Also, can we take a second just to admire the microtransaction roadmap? Pretty competent work considering we've been asking for a content roadmap for years and recieved nothing.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/ancient-rituals-and-valuable-supplies-in-the-gem-store/

I did admire it and it's not the first time either. It seems there is a team who manages to pump out content on the regular, release detailed roadmaps and stick to schedule. It just happens to be the mtx team.

You mean the team that doesn't have to do area works/reworks, write associated stories, assemble scripts and voice actors, and then put it all together and hopefully test it out to make sure it works? It's a hell of a lot easier to design cosmetics and other stuff for the cash shop, because those items don't have to have a lot of other stuff done to go with it. The more you know...

Your point? Where exactly, in that quote, did I comment on the complexity of the task?

Since you mentioned it though, there are plenty of teams, in many studios, who do all the things you described and yet manage to provide a release schedule and mostly stick to it. Anet and GW2 pre LS4 included.

I thought I was rather clear in the post you quoted: it takes a lot less time, and a lot less resources, no matter how many teams you have, to develop content for the cash shop, and since that's the primary source of income keeping the game running, maybe it's a good thing that they're on their schedules.

[Bast.7253]

@robertthebard.8150 said:

@AlexxxDelta.1806 said:

@robertthebard.8150 said:

@AlexxxDelta.1806 said:

@"zealex.9410" said:Also, can we take a second just to admire the microtransaction roadmap? Pretty competent work considering we've been asking for a content roadmap for years and recieved nothing.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/ancient-rituals-and-valuable-supplies-in-the-gem-store/

I did admire it and it's not the first time either. It seems there is a team who manages to pump out content on the regular, release detailed roadmaps and stick to schedule. It just happens to be the mtx team.

You mean the team that doesn't have to do area works/reworks, write associated stories, assemble scripts and voice actors, and then put it all together and hopefully test it out to make sure it works? It's a hell of a lot easier to design cosmetics and other stuff for the cash shop, because those items don't have to have a lot of other stuff done to go with it. The more you know...

Your point? Where exactly, in that quote, did I comment on the complexity of the task?

Since you mentioned it though, there are plenty of teams, in many studios, who do all the things you described and yet manage to provide a release schedule and mostly stick to it. Anet and GW2 pre LS4 included.

I thought I was rather clear in the post you quoted: it takes a lot less time, and a lot less resources, no matter how many teams you have, to develop content for the cash shop, and since that's the primary source of income keeping the game running, maybe it's a good thing that they're on their schedules.

I haven't been overly impressed with a lot of their gem store items lately either to be honest. But that's just my personal taste. I was really expecting them to go ham with mount skins as they are big ticket items that I would have imagined to had much more emphasis. Yet we only get a few wildly unique skins ever so often, one mount at a time.. i.e. Gecko, Shrine Guardian, Gecko, Armadillo, Peacock, etc. I imagine a lot of that has to do with aligning character rigs and what not onto the models if they stray too far from the original mount, but that would lead me to believe that they probably have fewer people working on them than you would think.. and that it takes quite a bit longer than you would imagine.

I don't want to see the game channel all of its flashy stuff into the gem store, but I think if they were already doing that we would have been seeing a lot more in the gem store than just two or three items every couple of weeks.

It felt like after Daybreak, development in general just started losing momentum, gem store and updates both. I definitely think, if the gem store was their sole priority, they would have been hitting it a lot harder than they have been though. I don't want to see the game go microtransaction crazy, but there are a lot of things they don't even sell on the gemstore that could be added for extra earning potential. A few I can think of, though it would upset some of the whales in the game, are infusions. You've got things like combat tonics, which might be a bit more complicated in terms of fitting in specific combat animations.. though that didn't seem to be a huge issue considering the Kodan's lack of profession specific animations. You've got guild halls, which have pretty much been abandoned, but you have the potential to sell decoration packages... of which could be preexisting assets that need collision tweaking and database integration. That's just a few things, that while aren't in extremely high demand, don't seem extremely challenging or resource intensive to implement.

Before this season they even had things like the garden plots in player instances, which seemed like a building block for other similar features, but we haven't seen any thing like that this season that I can recall. In general, I get the impression it's been stretched pretty thin for quite some time no matter what department you're in or what aspect of the game you're working on.

[Cobra.6509]

@"FrizzFreston.5290" said:i thought the two three month thing was more of a ideal goal than a "this is when we will release new episodes at any given time!" Guaranteed!

We thought this also....and 2-3 months cadence was OK with an expansion behind. Expansion and LW episodes(every 3 months) combined were OK like new content. But now without expansion only with LW episodes, 2-3 months will feel like forever.

[Teratus.2859]

@zealex.9410 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Ashantara.8731 said:

@Fenom.9457 said:Wow. I have no words. How can they possibly justify this?

They

did

justify it in the latest dev statement, where it was made

very

clear that they will discontinue their habit of releasing unfinished, unpolished content, even if that means that some releases will take longer.

Better that than drop unplayable content on us that ends up making us salty we can't play it on the specified day of release.That's happened to me on a few occasions and resulted in a fair bit of salt tbh

Thats a posibility but its hyperbole to say that this will happen everytime or most of the times if they dont take extra months for each episode.

Out of the last season i believe only one episode had problems of this scale.

I didn't say it would happen everytime etc.

Just saying I don't mind waiting a tad longer to avoid those kinds of problems, that's all ^^

[Ayakaru.6583]

They already announced that episide 6 would be late, so why the shock?I too don't want to wait, but at least we know not to be in a hurry

[Samnang.1879]

am personally tired of waiting too.

like why cant they release the leg. GREATSWORD on its own instead of bundling it up with an LW episode... the weapons dont even connect with the stories. personally dont care about LW stories... i just want to make my last 2nd gen weapon and then not have to care about saving up ores & woods anymore and focus on my next goal; which is to make 1st gen legendaries...

they r delaying my goals.. and its annoying me

[zealex.9410]

@Zaklex.6308 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Zaklex.6308 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@"Ben K.6238" said:The purchase 'deliveries' are not confirmed anywhere to coincide with other content releases. I'm not sure why you'd assume they do.

Ofc, its assumption, much like ppl assumed that ep6 wouldnt come out during the welcome back to gw2 innitiative.

Some ppl assumed that ep6 would come out next week, others in 2 weeks, anet never really says anything to confirm or not.

The theme of this update is to "prepare for war with kralk", thats what purpose the new item serves, so it could be safe to assume that the next episode could release at the end of it when preparations are complete.

Im just asking for some clarification.

For those of you looking for the relevant information regarding future content release I will quote it here directly from the roadmap, the most important part is in bold and underlined:

"Content teams will have more flexibility to decide what makes sense for a given release—for example, we could focus on expanding the boundaries and content of an existing map if that would provide a better experience than creating a new one. Ultimately, this will mean a relatively steady release of new content that will allow us to continue telling the story of Tyria in exciting new ways.

The Next Few Months~snip~

We’re in the process of wrapping up Episode 6 now, and we’re excited to not only announce a release date, but also to play the finale alongside all of you. It won’t fall within the two-to-three-month window that we tried to target throughout Season 4 because of the adjustments we had to make in February, but stay tuned—more info is coming soon.

We’re currently adding more polish to the final encounter in the next raid, which continues the story of Qadim and will get its own release after Episode 6. We’re utilizing one of the new team’s efforts to build some additional small-scale open world content so all of our players will have something to celebrate with the release of the raid."

If that isn't clear enough without them actually including dates(which seems highly unlikely until they have an actual release date), then there's nothing that will satisfy you.

That the episode would be delayed is common knowledge, the point is that the extent this episode is being delayed might be abit extreme. The episode is already 22 days off the target.

Did you miss the part where it says that it won't fall within the 2 - 3 month window? Do you really need more clarification than that based on the layoffs and restructuring?

I didnt, im jot complaining that it will take longer than 3 months, im asking if its gonna take almost 5 months.

[AlexxxDelta.1806]

@robertthebard.8150 said:and since that's the primary source of income keeping the game running, maybe it's a good thing that they're on their schedules.

I'm a consumer/player not a shareholder so I 'd much prefer it if content updates for the actual game were on schedule rather than gem store ones.

[kratan.4619]

It's ok Anet, I will be here when it releases. No rush.

[Dragon Priestess.9760]

I just wanted to quickly add that they did kinda recently have to deal with 1/3 of their company being laid off. Everything and everyone's been shuffled around. It's probably been really stressful for them. The company is made up of people, not machines, and we should be supportive and understanding of what they are going through still.

[adormtil.1605]

I heard restructuring happened. Is GW2 doing bad, I heard its one of the biggest MMO on the planet. Why does this happen do they not know that for an MMO to keep going it needs more content? Well constant content.

[ProtoGunner.4953]

Lol release schedule became ridiculous now. And there isn't even a planned expansion this year. Holy, no wonder people are running away in masses (just an assumption but I love the drama).

[robertthebard.8150]

@AlexxxDelta.1806 said:

@robertthebard.8150 said:and since that's the primary source of income keeping the game running, maybe it's a good thing that they're on their schedules.

I'm a consumer/player not a shareholder so I 'd much prefer it if content updates for the

actual

game

were on schedule rather than gem store ones.

You won't be either if they can't keep the lights on. Keeping one game running in Maintenance mode isn't that hard to do, but 2?

[Zaklex.6308]

@ProtoGunner.4953 said:Lol release schedule became ridiculous now. And there isn't even a planned expansion this year. Holy, no wonder people are running away in masses (just an assumption but I love the drama).

A completely wrong assumption on your part, no one is running away in masses...layoffs had zero to do with GW2 but most people don't know how to read quarterly reports anyways, the regular public should just stay away from them.

[zealex.9410]

@adormtil.1605 said:I heard restructuring happened. Is GW2 doing bad, I heard its one of the biggest MMO on the planet. Why does this happen do they not know that for an MMO to keep going it needs more content? Well constant content.

And consistent. Game wont see growth without consistency.

[ProtoGunner.4953]

@Zaklex.6308 said:

@ProtoGunner.4953 said:Lol release schedule became ridiculous now. And there isn't even a planned expansion this year. Holy, no wonder people are running away in masses (just an assumption but I love the drama).

A completely wrong assumption on your part, no one is running away in masses...layoffs had zero to do with GW2 but most people don't know how to read quarterly reports anyways, the regular public should just stay away from them.

I am pretty sure that there are a lot less players now. It's just natural, feels natural and happens with most older MMOs, the genre is not that popular anymore. Also there is almost no (big) media coverage anymore and people don't event talk about the game. Just count the number of reviews of POF on metacritic - says a lot. Everything else is just playing it down. Will not say there won't be stuff coming for the game but they surely lost momentum - a lot.

[Astralporing.1957]

@Zaklex.6308 said:

@ProtoGunner.4953 said:Lol release schedule became ridiculous now. And there isn't even a planned expansion this year. Holy, no wonder people are running away in masses (just an assumption but I love the drama).

A completely wrong assumption on your part, no one is running away in masses...layoffs had zero to do with GW2 but most people don't know how to read quarterly reports anyways, the regular public should just stay away from them.If they had nothing to do with layoffs, then why they have caused such a delay in release schedule?

[Blocki.4931]

@Astralporing.1957 said:

@Zaklex.6308 said:

@ProtoGunner.4953 said:Lol release schedule became ridiculous now. And there isn't even a planned expansion this year. Holy, no wonder people are running away in masses (just an assumption but I love the drama).

A completely wrong assumption on your part, no one is running away in masses...layoffs had zero to do with GW2 but most people don't know how to read quarterly reports anyways, the regular public should just stay away from them.If they had nothing to do with layoffs, then why they have caused such a delay in release schedule?

Because even though most of those people didn't work on GW2 directly, they were still colleagues and dear friends.

[AlexxxDelta.1806]

@Blocki.4931 said:

@Astralporing.1957 said:

@Zaklex.6308 said:

@ProtoGunner.4953 said:Lol release schedule became ridiculous now. And there isn't even a planned expansion this year. Holy, no wonder people are running away in masses (just an assumption but I love the drama).

A completely wrong assumption on your part, no one is running away in masses...layoffs had zero to do with GW2 but most people don't know how to read quarterly reports anyways, the regular public should just stay away from them.If they had nothing to do with layoffs, then why they have caused such a delay in release schedule?

Because even though most of those people didn't work on GW2 directly, they were still colleagues and dear friends.

There are quite a few devs, directly involved with GW2, who are not with the company anymore since February. We have examples from these very forums even.

The layoffs were followed by the NCwest merger and internal restructuring within Anet. Apparently this is the main cause for this episode's delay. I don't know why are we even debating this since Mike Z himself said so in the recent blog post.