I love GW2, but the slow development is too apparent.

[RagiNagi.1802]

6 minutes ago, Vayne.8563 said:

So the games are the same except that some people can use a credit card and buy the weapon they want? Is that your argument.
 

There is no alternative for some of the more flashy armors/weapons in GW2. You just have to pay. There is no way of obtaining them in game, just go to the store and buy it - really limited trade elements. And, thus, reducing the sense of accomplishment. I am talking about how players can enjoy the game if being played how it was intended by the developer.

 

I am only saying that looting and trading systems was hitting much closer to home in GW1 than it does in GW2.

 

And don't pretend that similar problems like botted/stolen accounts and gold sellers are not present in GW2.

 

 

[Tekoneiric.6817]

I don't see the pace of story development being a big issue but I tend to have an eye for details. I see a lot of obvious areas of story development and content re-use that could be used to cut corners or inject current events to keep players busy. It even started with the early development of the game when they didn't reuse the GW1 maps and alter them for current time.

 

There is a lot of areas and resources they could reuse. They wasted resources on developing raid only maps when they could have utilized the development of new maps for living world episodes could include early access raid paths on the very same maps. Doing that would have doubled the amount of raids while reducing the animosity of players who dislike instanced squad content because those players would have story content on post-raid maps as they would be open Living Word PvE maps.

 

Many players hoped we would get a full Eye of the North map yet the developers failed to provide that, instead they ignored the nostalgia factor and developed other maps. If the Icebrood maps had been a bit farther south; Grothmar Valley could have lead to EotN with Whisper in the Dark and Shadow in the Ice on a tighter Bjora Marches map north of Bitterfrost Frontier; reusing the bitter cold and night time storm. Reusing the GW1 EotN topography would have saved them a little time in map / story planning. Bjora Marches could have been the same size as Bitterfrost Frontier. The boneskinner could have stalked the forests outside of EotN.

[DaniTheHero.6318]

On 8/3/2021 at 4:21 PM, Tekoneiric.6817 said:

I don't see the pace of story development being a big issue but I tend to have an eye for details. I see a lot of obvious areas of story development and content re-use that could be used to cut corners or inject current events to keep players busy. It even started with the early development of the game when they didn't reuse the GW1 maps and alter them for current time.

 

There is a lot of areas and resources they could reuse. They wasted resources on developing raid only maps when they could have utilized the development of new maps for living world episodes could include early access raid paths on the very same maps. Doing that would have doubled the amount of raids while reducing the animosity of players who dislike instanced squad content because those players would have story content on post-raid maps as they would be open Living Word PvE maps.

 

Many players hoped we would get a full Eye of the North map yet the developers failed to provide that, instead they ignored the nostalgia factor and developed other maps. If the Icebrood maps had been a bit farther south; Grothmar Valley could have lead to EotN with Whisper in the Dark and Shadow in the Ice on a tighter Bjora Marches map north of Bitterfrost Frontier; reusing the bitter cold and night time storm. Reusing the GW1 EotN topography would have saved them a little time in map / story planning. Bjora Marches could have been the same size as Bitterfrost Frontier. The boneskinner could have stalked the forests outside of EotN.

IBS was very disappointing to me.

After replaying LW4 the difference in writing quality is apparent.

[Dawdler.8521]

 

On 8/3/2021 at 3:21 PM, Tekoneiric.6817 said:

They wasted resources

Haha if we compare bugfixes to content, Anet doesnt know the meaning of those words.

 

They've released 4 or so living stories and 1 full expansion in the same time period they have completely failed to fix a broken 2x2x4 meter wall mesh thats missing from 1 out 3 upgrade tiers, a fix that a 12 year old could probably do with an hours worth of experience in Blender.

Edited August 5, 2021 by Dawdler.8521

[nosleepdemon.1368]

On 8/2/2021 at 4:04 AM, stubbiz.4921 said:

Slow,maybe. But Gw2 is also a totally different mmo to those you named here. There is no need for that fast updates and progression. 

Guildwars2 is the casual players Dreams. How many popular mmo's can yo just quit for a few months, log back inn and just start again with no penalty or catching UP to do. Only loss is player skills ofc.  GW2 is truly an unike and greate mmo.

 

I see GW2 described as casual a lot, but it's not really. GW2 offers a lot of difficult content, and there's a metric kitten-load of stuff to farm if that's what you want. What GW2 is though, is an MMO done *right*. It only feels casual because it's actually fun to play even if all you are doing is the WoW equivalent of dailies. Unlike other MMOs GW2 manages to make playing feel enjoyable instead of a compulsory chore. The "Legendary Mythic Miasma God Breaker Beardy Bellend+++" items in GW2 are cosmetic, so as you rightly point out - you can just drop them for a while and come back without having lost progress. Also, I don't remember the last time employees staged a walk out in protest of the kitten way they were being treated. ANet did axe half their staff, but I do get the impression that they're pretty decent to work for. So, you know, I don't mind throwing $$ at them knowing the people who make all this cool stuff aren't having a terrible time of it.

Edited August 5, 2021 by nosleepdemon.1368

[ChronoPinoyX.7923]

4 minutes ago, nosleepdemon.1368 said:

 

I see GW2 described as casual a lot, but it's not really. GW2 offers a lot of difficult content, and there's a metric kitten-load of stuff to farm if that's what you want. What GW2 is though, is an MMO done *right*. It only feels casual because it's actually fun to play even if all you are doing is the WoW equivalent of dailies. Unlike other MMOs GW2 manages to make playing feel enjoyable instead of a compulsory chore. The "Legendary Mythic Miasma God Breaker Beardy Bellend+++" items in GW2 are cosmetic, so as you rightly point out - you can just drop them for a while and come back without having lost progress. Also, I don't remember the last time employees staged a walk out in protest of the kitten way they were being treated. ANet did axe half their staff, but I do get the impression that they're pretty decent to work for. So, you know, I don't mind throwing $$ at them knowing the people who make all this cool stuff aren't having a terrible time of it.

That wasn't ANets fault, that was actually NCSoft's decision, so the blame is on NCSoft. ArenaNet had no say on who got laid off, which is one of the biggest drawbacks of being a subsidiary to a publishing company. 

[gloflop.3510]

I checked the financial figures of anet (better said its parent company ncsoft). The revenues fell from 2018 to 2019 by 25%. They remained constant from 2019 to 2020. If we keep in mind that anet does not want to lose money with gw2, they somewhere have to cut costs. A main source of their costs and thus a main area where they can cut costs are the employees. In other words: Anet fired devs. What happens when there are less devs? The amount of new content goes down. The consequence is that less people are playing the game and leaving money with which anet can pay their employees. We are in this downward cycle. The biggest hope is that the new expansion will bring players back and helps funding new devs. Else, it will become pretty dark for the game.

[Krzysztof.5973]

4 hours ago, nosleepdemon.1368 said:

 

I see GW2 described as casual a lot, but it's not really. GW2 offers a lot of difficult content, and there's a metric kitten-load of stuff to farm if that's what you want. What GW2 is though, is an MMO done *right*. It only feels casual because it's actually fun to play even if all you are doing is the WoW equivalent of dailies.

Did you mean the 2 years from last raid wing release or 1 fractal cm boss a year? What is there to do for 'difficult content'?
That is why people call it casual MMO. 

[vicky.9751]

The update cycle is comparable to ff14, we get updates every 3 months in both games. Every mmo does this ...like even genshin impact updates on a cycle. 

 

Edited August 6, 2021 by vicky.9751

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

22 minutes ago, gloflop.3510 said:

I checked the financial figures of anet (better said its parent company ncsoft). The revenues fell from 2018 to 2019 by 25%. They remained constant from 2019 to 2020. If we keep in mind that anet does not want to lose money with gw2, they somewhere have to cut costs. A main source of their costs and thus a main area where they can cut costs are the employees. In other words: Anet fired devs. What happens when there are less devs? The amount of new content goes down. The consequence is that less people are playing the game and leaving money with which anet can pay their employees. We are in this downward cycle. The biggest hope is that the new expansion will bring players back and helps funding new devs. Else, it will become pretty dark for the game.

So, are you saying ArenaNet did not tell the truth when releasing statements about who initiated the loss of 100+ employees?  That NCSoft did not send a missive demanding ArenaNet pare their employee count? 

That the number of lost employees matched the number of employees (Devs) working on other projects and not working on Guild Wars 2, and anyone left from those other projects moved to work on Guild Wars 2?

[radda.8920]

47 minutes ago, gloflop.3510 said:

I checked the financial figures of anet (better said its parent company ncsoft). The revenues fell from 2018 to 2019 by 25%. They remained constant from 2019 to 2020. If we keep in mind that anet does not want to lose money with gw2, they somewhere have to cut costs. A main source of their costs and thus a main area where they can cut costs are the employees. In other words: Anet fired devs. What happens when there are less devs? The amount of new content goes down. The consequence is that less people are playing the game and leaving money with which anet can pay their employees. We are in this downward cycle. The biggest hope is that the new expansion will bring players back and helps funding new devs. Else, it will become pretty dark for the game.

 

good luck attracting new players with fishing and turtles.

 

It's not with a pve where  they do the strict minimum and a pvp in brain death that you attract people.

 

They'll just keep their current players and still I'm not even sure. There is too much competition in front of them for gw2 to be attractive . Especially with nothing innovative proposed in the last announcement.

Edited August 5, 2021 by radda.8920

[Celtic Lady.3729]

I don't mind slow development. It'll give me time to play SWTOR and New World.

[nosleepdemon.1368]

1 hour ago, Krzysztof.5973 said:

Did you mean the 2 years from last raid wing release or 1 fractal cm boss a year? What is there to do for 'difficult content'?
That is why people call it casual MMO. 

 

Then they'd be wrong wouldn't they. A casual game is something that doesn't require a great deal of skill or effort to play, hence "casual". GW2 might be lacking for new content, but the high end content that's there is just as challenging as in any other MMORPG.

[Doggie.3184]

On 8/2/2021 at 3:35 AM, DanAlcedo.3281 said:

Blizzard had like 2500 devs on a protest. 

I don't know how many devs Ff14 has. 

 

Anet has devs in the low hundreds.  Like 200-300 maybe. 

Anet is simply not as big as other MMO companies. 

 

Just because two people sell a similar product doesn't mean you can put both to the same standards. 

 

 

 

 

They also don't really communicate what they're working on much or really try to figure out what their playerbase even wants though. Their NDA has done a lot of consistant damage to the game's development. There are indie companies with the same or less amount of people who pull off a lot more.

[gloflop.3510]

1 hour ago, Inculpatus cedo.9234 said:

So, are you saying ArenaNet did not tell the truth when releasing statements about who initiated the loss of 100+ employees?  That NCSoft did not send a missive demanding ArenaNet pare their employee count? 

That the number of lost employees matched the number of employees (Devs) working on other projects and not working on Guild Wars 2, and anyone left from those other projects moved to work on Guild Wars 2?

I believe that this statement from anet was correct and that they fired devs because they shut down the project. However, I assume strongly that they also reduced the number of employees afterwards. This is not only done by firing an employee. It can also be that anet didn't fill an empty position again from someone who left the company.

 

I wanted to point in my earlier comment towards the cycle of less revenue, less employees, less revenue,... This cycle is where I see the biggest problems.

 

[gloflop.3510]

3 minutes ago, Doggie.3184 said:

 

They also don't really communicate what they're working on much or really try to figure out what their playerbase even wants though. Their NDA has done a lot of consistant damage to the game's development. There are indie companies with the same or less amount of people who pull off a lot more.

This is in my eyes a brilliant point. Being small is not only a disadvantage, it can also become an advantage. It is much easier to communicate among each other and with the playerbase. Decisions can be done faster. New brave ideas can get through easier. This is what I would focus on if I were the head of anet.

 

Let me support your argument with a tiny story: Several years ago (shortly after HoT release), a dev asked how to change the PvP-map "Skyhammer" to make it attractive for the players. It was a different map back then compared to today. The dev wrote here in the forum and he got lots of feedback. He also managed the discussion. After 2-3 days, the discussion was over. I saw some time later an interview with the same dev who said roughly the following "I asked the community what they like. They gave me some feedback. It was something else than I would have liked but we implemented their feedback". Skyhammer and the later released maps "Revenge of the Capricorn" and "Coliseum" are all very popular maps in PvP. I want to show with the story which positive effects a tiny discussion here in the forum can have.

[Shiyo.3578]

Anet took almost all their devs off this game and put it in maintenance mode after releasing PoF. NCSoft had to tell them to stop it and put people back on GW2.

Edited August 11, 2021 by Shiyo.3578

[Kalocin.5982]

On 8/5/2021 at 6:19 PM, vicky.9751 said:

The update cycle is comparable to ff14, we get updates every 3 months in both games. Every mmo does this ...like even genshin impact updates on a cycle. 

 

Pretty much, and FFXIV usually has a tick tock approach to patches where one is usually pretty big while the other is a lot smaller. Just like most MMOs there's a bit of a content draught before expansions. Luckily with GW2 it's not outdated though so you can actually make use of the older stuff.

 

I kinda feel like a lot of folks here don't play other games, when you get busy living and play other games the breaks between GW2 aren't even a bit deal. I recently got back into it again with the boss rush and anniversary but I'll likely be relaxing my time soon enough to get back to Monster Hunter Stories 2 or the other list of games to play

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

5 hours ago, Shiyo.3578 said:

Anet took almost all their devs off this game and put it in maintenance mode after releasing PoF. NCSoft had to tell them to stop it and put people back on GW2.

This is absolutely not true. 

[Aphandra.9672]

Personal opinion.

 

GW2 development might be a little slow. But maybe it's the optimum: there is occasionally new content that makes you return or try out a new specialisation, while there isn't too much content to overwhelm (new players).

 

The way I read the OP is "I like the game and I would love more". Sensible. The alternative is looking for other, similar games and getting new experiences. I've spent too much time in the WoW bubble and regret it.

 

I wouldn't want a monthly fee. Sure, it hooks you to a game due to fear of wasting your money, but that's a recipe for burnout. Plus I've spent about 225€ on this game, which is still cheap compared to what WoW costs (or simulator DLCs), but a fairly big chunk compared to single player games with a similar feel (Skyrim, Witcher...).

Edited August 11, 2021 by Aphandra.9672

[yefluke.3168]

They are slow, and I don't know why. They are never officially tell us why.

If this is the case to make the game shut down in 3-5 years. so that's it.

[Jin.8501]

On 8/5/2021 at 8:30 PM, ChronoPinoyX.7923 said:

That wasn't ANets fault, that was actually NCSoft's decision, so the blame is on NCSoft. ArenaNet had no say on who got laid off, which is one of the biggest drawbacks of being a subsidiary to a publishing company. 

Well its obviously that the game doesn't make enough money to justify having that many employees. And also corporate greed of course 

[ChronoPinoyX.7923]

6 minutes ago, Jin.8501 said:

Well its obviously that the game doesn't make enough money to justify having that many employees. And also corporate greed of course 

That literally couldn't be more wrong. The game itself makes plenty money for NCSoft, the reason they did this is because NCSoft tried to launch some unknown new IP which horribly failed afterwards. And guess where the staff for that new IP came from? Yep, ANet. When things fail, it's the developers who get sacked even if the publisher is fully at fault. 

[LadyEden.7519]

On 8/2/2021 at 9:52 AM, DaniTheHero.6318 said:

Perhaps a solution to at least slightly close that gap is to
1) Actually advertise the game?

 

I agree. If the game was more popular, they could hire more developers and release more content more frequently.

 

The thing is: I am getting the impression that ANet actually enjoys being a smaller-scale game company. (shrugs)

[Eloc Freidon.5692]

I started playing the game when Bitterfrost Frontier was released. Ever since then, production and released were smooth and decently paced! IBS really collapsed the house of cards.