Guild Wars 2

I’ve recently heard lots of fuss about the money from gem purchases not going in to Arenanets pockets but instead floating to other games that are under NCsoft publishing, such as the development of WildStar.

I love GW2 so much and I’ve believed that every penny I’ve spent on Gems has been for the game I love, but the thought of supporting games I hate ankitten ot intending to play infuriates me endlessly.

So, do I support Anet with my purchases or not?
(Note, if this thread gets deleted I will take that as direct answer from the community managers telling me I should stop making purchases)

Most likely going to fund development for Wildstar so they can hype it up, release it, milk players for cash shop purchases and repeat with another game after 1 year of Wildstar

From what I’ve seen of Wildstar on YouTube, I’ll stay with Guild Wars 2.

As a business owner, I feel that it’s unreasonable to expect that the company should spend all the money on only one thing. How would companies innovate new products?

Legacy games that a lot of us still love, like Guild Wars 1, also benefit from spread the wealth.

It’s not like the companies are out to scam you, take your money, and spend it on something else. They are doing the same thing as every other software development company that has more than one product.

Publishers as far as my knowledge goes, are NOT the innovators. They are the backers for innovation at best, just there to reap the rewards afterwards.
I will probably stop spending money on gemstore and just get my stuff with gold instead, because nothing NCsoft has put out is of any value to me and thus does not deserve my support. It would make so much more sense from consumers standpoint to direct the flow of money from product to the creator of that product, so that it A: makes the product better and B: Supports good future products from the creator.

I don’t think it works that way.

The staff are likely getting paid no matter what but when you buy gems it looks good on the publisher’s quarterly reports, showing that this license is profitable, so they extend various contracts and the developers keep their jobs for another quarter. They aren’t waiting for your gem purchases to go buy their groceries.

NCSOFT owns the holding company that owns ArenaNet and Carbine Studios. A holding company NCSOFT formed late November last year to hold their western subsidiaries that they already owned 100% of.

One way to look at it is all sales of all products go into a big pot and that money gets distributed to all the various entities in NCSOFT as NCSOFT sees fit.

Another way to look at it is each developer and distribution entity (NC Interactive and NC Europe) takes in their own sales, handle their own expenses and any profits are sent back to NCSOFT and any losses are covered by NCSOFT.

In the case of NC West Holdings which now own ArenaNet, Carbine and NC Interactive (unclear about NC Europe is part of this), which was created with it’s own $45 million or so piggy bank, it’s possible that it can cover it’s own losses and the profits can be claimed on paper by NCSOFT but not raided in full by them (think of the $45 million start up bank as a loan that is being repaid by the holding company entity).

Pick your poison. At the end of the day, it doesn’t really matter in NCSOFT’s quarterly reports but if you are an aficionado of chapeaus made of Reynolds Wrap feel free to believe what you will.

NCsoft paid for this game. No NCsoft = No GW2, simple as that.

Whenever you buy gems or the game itself, the money goes to NCsoft who already invested money in this game so, what’s the problem?

And just you know, keeping an online game cost a kittenload of money (specially big ones like GW).
Also, people on Anet don’t work for free so, if we don’t buy gems, then NCsoft will shutdown the servers and of course, no work for Anet, no GW for you and no bowls of chocolate chip ice cream for my necro.
So if you really love GW and want to keep playing for many more years then buy gems, after all, you are making NCsoft more rich but in the end, you are supporting Anet and GW.

your money goes to NCSOFT, not ANET.

Resonance.4216:

your money goes to NCSOFT, not ANET.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3F_ZcvR-pg

AHHHGGG!!! Burn this with fire, someone, please!

Don’t buy gems to support neither NCsoft or ArenaNet.
Buy gems for yourself and only yourself.Only if YOU think there is something worth buying on the store spend you rl cash (and not gold) for gems.And don’t spend your few leftover gems for rng kitten only because you can’t buy anytyhing worthwhile.

That way you increase the qualite of the game no matter who gets the cash from gems.

daimasei.4091:

NCsoft paid for this game. No NCsoft = No GW2, simple as that.

.. and I love Dontain but he’s way off base on this. Because he speaks it doesn’t make it true. Ask him what his business development experience is, other than making his Razer sponsored YouTube channel (notice I am plugging him while saying this!!)

A

As with every other company …

The money goes to NCSoft, who first pays employees first, then investors, then GW2, Lineage, Wildstar etc etc. GW2 is a successful money maker, I expect a lot of future investments to keep it at a good moneymaking level.

That said, isn’t this a stupid question. If I sell something to a customer, who gets the money? Me or my boss? Ain’t such things self explanatory?

marnick.4305:

As with every other company …

The money goes to NCSoft, who first pays employees first, then investors, then GW2, Lineage, Wildstar etc etc. GW2 is a successful money maker, I expect a lot of future investments to keep it at a good moneymaking level.

It’s a good thing you’re an insider at NC and every other company to tell us exactly how they distribute their funds to product development. Oh wait….

That said, isn’t this a stupid question. If I sell something to a customer, who gets the money? Me or my boss? Ain’t such things self explanatory?

Depends entirely on who you are and who your boss is and the nature of the roles you have at the company. So no, it’s not a stupid question but yours is a pretty stupid analogy since employees and wholly owned subsidiaries are not at all equivalent relations.

Ichihaifu.7941:

I’ve recently heard lots of fuss about the money from gem purchases not going in to Arenanets pockets but instead floating to other games that are under NCsoft publishing, such as the development of WildStar.

It is the sad fact of all Guild Wars 2 experience. NcSoft made a game and abandoned it in favor of other titles. Million players down the toilet. Without REAL new content there is no way someone can keep the player base.

Not to mention that if the money went to Arena Net we would have TONS of new content every week, faster bug fixes and trait reworks.

They realized this and they said they’re planning an expansion. Unfortunately it is too late, very few players that quit return to the game.

You are supporting the whole company as a whole. Not only the studio.

Otherwise, how would NCSoft be able to pay for it’s operations? NCSoft doesn’t design games itself. Who is going to pay for the marketing department? Customer Service? Finance?

Let alone, think of GW2 before release. Where did they get the hundred millions to fund the game? They got it through NCSoft’s sales from previously released games, such as GW1 and Lineage.

Conversely, how do you expect NCSoft to pay for Wildstar, when they haven’t even started selling it?

You’re going to be an extremely lonely and frustrated consumer if you boycott companies that don’t reinvest 100% of their funds from a sole product.

I liken to it to the recent textile situation in Bangladesh, where people started to boycott merchandise sewn in 3rd world countries.

I bet those very people who go these protests will see that it’s not only hard, but expensive to find 1st-world apparel.

I’m supporting Gamestop lol

Leablo.2651:

marnick.4305:

As with every other company …

The money goes to NCSoft, who first pays employees first, then investors, then GW2, Lineage, Wildstar etc etc. GW2 is a successful money maker, I expect a lot of future investments to keep it at a good moneymaking level.

It’s a good thing you’re an insider at NC and every other company to tell us exactly how they distribute their funds to product development. Oh wait….

I don’t pretend to work for NCSoft but I do have a job. This is simply how business is done. If you didn’t know that yet, I can only make one conclusion.

That said, isn’t this a stupid question. If I sell something to a customer, who gets the money? Me or my boss? Ain’t such things self explanatory?

Depends entirely on who you are and who your boss is and the nature of the roles you have at the company. So no, it’s not a stupid question but yours is a pretty stupid analogy since employees and wholly owned subsidiaries are not at all equivalent relations.

Not at all equivalent but paying someone doesn’t necessarily mean he gets the money, is all I’m saying. Even the CEO of a wholly owned subsidiaries merely gets a salary (if his books aren’t cooked). It’s no use discussing this further since that’s simply how stuff works. If you expected A.net to get 100% of the money, you were wrong.

I know NC gets the money but I just have this deep grudge for them.

CoH was my very first MMO (played GW shortly after like 1 month after my first CoH subscription ended) and they ended it.

I also played that blackhole known as “Aion”. I wasted 2~3 years of my.life trying to get BiS gear and getting it 8 months later if I’m lucky.

Although I have no one to blame but myself for Aion… Those are years I could have spent cherishing my time with GW1

it goes to NCSoft’s coffer. where does NCSoft spend it on ? none of our business…..

Not the starving orphans in Africa.

LumAnth.5124:

I know NC gets the money but I just have this deep grudge for them.

Grudge for a company … I would realign my priorities if I were you. Do not love and do not hate companies, they don’t feel anything for you either.

Although I have no one to blame but myself for Aion… Those are years I could have spent cherishing my time with GW1

I played Aion for a grand 3 months, one month was launch month during which I only played the queue … I have more regret for WoW but learned a lot from that too, how to spot a grind game early on.

I’m surprised NCSoft managed to avoid the clear grind with Guild Wars 2, I do think they want to make a sustainable western brand with Guild Wars. Gives me hope for the future.

Resonance.4216:

your money goes to NCSOFT, not ANET.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3F_ZcvR-pg

I hope you realize that your money goes to both NCSoft AND ANet. Not just because it trickles back down to ANet from NCSoft, but because ANet gets a portion of all their profits (or if you want to look at it optimistically, NCSoft gets a portion of ANet’s profit).

The only thing I can agree with the video is that I’m interested in new content. Living Story is fun, but it’s catering to the casuals too much. And while I understand that there are casuals, I feel like the game is too slow-paced because of that.

However, I do enjoy the slow-pace sometimes, because stuff happens. Say, I have finals or midterms. Now I can relax even with an event going on because I have the time to finish it.

The main part of the game that I feel diminishes the hardcore aspect of the game is DR. I’d rather have a system where your overall stats will diminish based on your MF (higher MF = higher stat decay OTHER than MF, which won’t decay) so you CAN farm items. But the longer you do farm items, the harder it gets. 30 minutes of farming is nothing. I’m used to mindless grinding for 4+ hours on end, but when the drops just diminish after 30 minutes, it’s hard to do anything. I wouldn’t mind if the mobs became harder. I wouldn’t mind if there was an instanced hardmode of zones (think GW1). I wouldn’t mind if there was vanquishing to get rewards. There is no point in farming items because you can just farm CoF P1 and then buy the items faster than you can farm them.

Esplen.3940:

The only thing I can agree with the video is that I’m interested in new content. Living Story is fun, but it’s catering to the casuals too much. And while I understand that there are casuals, I feel like the game is too slow-paced because of that.

Ask yourself several question.
1/ what would be the ratio of casuals vs hardcores in any setting including but not limited to videogames?

2/ who brings in the most money in a videogame? Those who play 8 hours a day to get ahead or those who play 1 hour a day who catch up with gems?

After answering 1/ and 2/, ask yourself how to cover the player base best, by adding hardcore content or casual content?

I hope some of the money goes to Wildstar, i want to play that awesome game

lekyii.9856:

I hope some of the money goes to Wildstar, i want to play that awesome game

If that game can keep you occupied for another 10 months, go for it. I bet coppers to gems that most so-called hardcores will be done with wildstar in a few months too.

Do people really think that the developers get all the money from sold games?

Resonance.4216:

your money goes to NCSOFT, not ANET.

If GW2 brings in money, GW2 will get more resources to produce expansions. The money you pay does go to other projects, just like any time you spend money at a business. However, the gem store does support GW2 because NCSoft sees the money coming in from the Gem Store which means NCSoft will want to support the GW2 development team.

I’ve been hearing lately that when I purchase gems, that the money goes to NCSoft and not ANET. Also that the money supports NCSoft in creating other games and does not directly support Guild Wars 2.

This is extremely upsetting, I buy things from the Gem store to directly support my game (GW2). To hear that it does not… makes me not want to purchase anything from the Gem store anymore.

Can anyone shed some light on this?

7 posts down:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/bltc/Who-am-I-supporting-when-I-buy-gems/first#post2245578

Looking at the sales numbers for NCSOFT’s subsidiaries it appears that online sales are assigned to ANet while store sales are assigned to either NC Interactive or NC Europe. But in the end it’s still all NCSOFT’s money.

Think of it this way OP. If everyone stopped buying gems because they THOUGHT that the profit didn’t go to this game, this game would be making no profit. If they game makes no profit, this game gets canceled. There’ll be no game that you love.

It is completely irrelevant where the money goes. It doesn’t matter. Because if this game does badly because people don’t buy gems, there won’t be a game.

Think of it this way. Gem and game sales is a way NCSOFT measures the success of the game. As long as it’s at what NCSOFT thinks is an acceptable level, relative to their other games or not, they will support it. It’s a way to keep score between their properties.

So a publisher (NCSoft) funds a developer (ArenaNet) so that they can develop Guild Wars 2 and the publisher is the bad guy for using a percentage of the money they earn to expand the other games they’re publishing and funding the development of other games that are currently unreleased?

A portion of the revenue from the Linage games and Aion probably funded GW2’s development.

Stop passing around Dontain’s misinformation please, he talks as if ALL the money made through GW2 should only be used to fund GW2.

Except here the publisher also owns the developer outright. Like how EA owns Maxis or Bioware.

Your supporting lots of people with the money you buy gems with…

Ultimately its the shareholders of (NCSoft) who took the risk to invest in producing video games, a lot of MMO’s in particular…

But before they get the final profits, if there is any, it pays the wages of loads of different people developers, programers, pr people, legal people, cleaners, security etc…

Just like any other company you buy goods/services from…

When a company is wholly owned by another company it’s not really not helpful to pit them against each other. Does NCSoft benefit from Anet’s success? Of course. They wouldn’t have bought them if they didn’t expect to benefit from it. Do you really think that Anet received no support from it’s relationship to NCSoft over the years of GW2’s development? Of course they did. That’s one of the reasons you would sell the company in the first place—to realize the benefits of deeper pockets. Is it perfect? No, it’s human, and there are many unfortunate consequences. But, it basically works and it really shouldn’t be the cause of so much angst on the net or forums. Would you rather that Bobby was running the show?

Almost all video games are funded by a publisher and typically the company being funded by the publisher is owned by the publisher. Indirectly we fund a game buy spending money on that game. Nothing has changed since the days of GW 1 as they were owned by NCsoft way back then too. As long as a game generates sufficient revenue the game continues to exist and new content be developed. Even if arenanet were a stand alone company with multiple titles they owned and continued to develop content for the same methods of handling the revenue would be used. Obviously the more revenue a game generates the more funds that are put towards it’s future development. This is common sense really at least to me.

As far as buying gems goes. Whether you buy them with in game gold or buy them with real life money, real life money got spent to get you those gems. Remember the gems you buy with gold someone else bought with real life money and sold with the in game exchange for gold. So in essence you are still spending real money. So if anyone still wants to hold to boycott mentality because the money doesn’t go directly to arenanet you would have to boycott buying gems completely. However I’m not in support of such a boycott because as I said the more revenue a game generates the more funds they will have available to them for future development. And given the fact that NCsoft announced we are getting an expansion pack I think establishes to us that they are willing to put the funds we provided to them on the game we are spending the money on.

Plus it’s not like the last 9 months have been void of development. Not that these events have been the greatest content but I did like the climax of each. Plus if you like all the skins and such we got from in game and gems then all the more stuff to like. I know I like the mini pets we got. I’m also glad we are getting them in ways other than a gamble box. i do hope that next year for the early holiday events they rectify that with those minis and what not put in a minipet 3 pack for example like we got.