Guild Wars 2

I couldn’t finish the clock tower because it brought my issues with GW2’s camera too much into the foreground (specifically its collision behaviour). So I’m hoping that the camera will be fixed next Halloween, because I would like to do this again.

I found the tower itself pretty awesome, actually. The atmosphere was flawless (especially thanks to the music which gets entirely too little credit), and the jumps were challenging, but in a consistent manner. I did notice that it was rather annoying to run it with a group of bigger characters because it became hard to see the borders of the walkable ground, but on the other hand, running with a group meant I could see where others jumped or failed, which I think was good compensation. Mind that I can’t speak for the last part, as I never reached it.

Josh: please don’t feel bad about your creation. There are more factors to an event’s success than the design itself. How the event is integrated, how it is advertised, how it interacts with game mechanics, these are all things that the whole Halloween team has an impact on. If you scour the forums, you will find that most people who had trouble with the tower are pinpointing one or two details that gave them these troubles, not the entirety of the puzzle. Don’t be discouraged by people throwing around strawman arguments in a black&white mentality.

I really liked this jumping puzzle and i think designer made awesome job, this is far my favorite of all of them. I completed it 20ish times so far and imo its not that hard, it’s panic what make ppl fail.

I wouldn’t like to see upcoming jumping puzzles nerfed to oblivion so everyone could complete it in few tries. I failed like 30 times before i got to the top, maybe more, but once i completed it, it was different story.

It would have been less annoying if I hadn’t kept snagging on everything and nothing, might be due to doing it with a Norn, haven’t tried with another race.

I gave up on it. Even though I did it during off-peak times, there were FAR too many people occluding my vision to see where I was standing, let alone where I needed to jump.

I never got past the first delayed floating stones segment. By the time the rest of the zerg moved through it so I could see where I was standing, it was already too late, and I had to start all over.

I must’ve tried at least a dozen times before getting more than utterly disgusted with the difficulty of the exercise.

It didn’t help that the only time I was able to try it was when all doors were forced open – all door meta-events were bugged on Blackgate prior to that patching.

Maybe next year.

I gave up.

after i blamed the masses of charr and norns, I decided to wake up at 5am and try.

I wasn’t alone but three to four people were with me.

anyway, didnt help

I suck.

i don’t blame A-net. just my clumsiness.

it have to be little slower for me, I mean the fog that chase you…

I gave up.

I do have all the rest achievements and the titles.

Efaicia”

’m sorry Focksbot but unless you are asking for him to give you a “practice” clocktower where you are there alone and there is no green goo, you are wrong, as others who have mastered it did not have that option and had to fight for their win. There are plenty of puzzles in this game where people can practice and fine tune their skills, Griffinrook run is a fine example.

With respect, your thinking seems very short-sighted. It’s easy to envisage a clocktower-type puzzle that starts off easy and gets gradually harder, so as to accommodate users playing at a lower level. As you get higher, the green goo starts rising faster and faster, and the jumps become harder.

Those who ‘mastered’ it did not possess some special human quality; they were acclimatised to the nature and specifics of this type of challenge, and felt comfortable undergoing the process of refinement. They could see clearly the route to mastery, while others could not. Yes, they fought for their win, but the difference is that their brains innately understood how to take on the challenge, rather than feeling hopelessly out of their depth.

(I’ve done many of the other jumping puzzles and I don’t believe they adequately prepare you for a timed one at all – they can all be done first time by carefully lining up the camera for each jump.)

Efaicia”

I am sick and tired of games that coddle me, and was thrilled to finaly be playing a game that was trying to kill my character.

You’ve been coddled just enough to feel comfortable with an increased level of challenge. The only difference is preparation. You wouldn’t feel this way if the nature of the puzzle was new to you – you’d be on here saying it made no sense and was unfair etc.

I’m sorry to spoil any theories people have here about their quality of character, but there’s no such dichotomy of players who like a challenge versus players who like to have their hand held. The vast majority players – nay, of human beings – need to have their hand held through strange, new experiences in order to acclimatise themselves to a new environment, and the vast majority then get fed up of hand-holding as soon as they feel comfortable with that new environment. Everybody likes a challenge, but nobody likes bewilderment. The only difference between you and other people who hated this challenge is preparation, something that could be resolved by changing the way a puzzle like this begins, giving it a difficulty ramp, rather than a difficulty cliff-face.

Good game designers know this. Even Super Meatboy starts off with easy levels.

Please stop demanding anything challenging be turned into a schoolyard swingset game.

Straw man. I’ve said repeatedly that challenge can be retained while providing a set-up that brings others up to speed. It’s difficult but it’s also just plain good game design.

I’m sorry, but I feel your ego is getting in the way of compromise. I also feel that ANet are going to be on my side about this – Josh has seen the feedback and he’s taken the correct lesson from it: retain challenge and difficulty, but place that challenge and difficulty in an environment where those coming to it will be acclimatised. It’s all about hitting people at the right point in their play experience. Sorry, but you are not some kind of hardcore veteran type; you’ve just been pre-coddled, where others haven’t.

I loved the Puzzle it was amazingly fun. my suggestion is to race segregate timed puzzles like these it was very hard as a asura surrounded by norn and char. but after a it of practice on my human i got it 3rd try on my asura.

I agree with Endless. It took me over two hours before I finally got up there but I enjoyed it all the same. However I do enjoy jumping puzzles and have jumped through most of them even though I’m the guy who somehow managed to drop off of the first chain in mad king’s dungeon… and that didn’t even require any jumping. Should tell something about my skills.

Most people probably fell because they panicked. The time limit forced people forward so they panicked. Simple as that. Personally I liked this as it made the jumping puzzle more exciting.

I guess in future it might be better to have more complex and dangerous jumping puzzles in events but without the time limit. Even slower folks can jump through those.

I still hope we will see more as exciting and fun jumping puzzles as the Clocktower.

I would like to see some changes to timed jumping quests in the future…esp those in groups.

Please disable all skill, stops people from spawning elementals, it’s already packed full of people.

Change all the armor/clothes to something standard (like swimwear for diving), that’ll make it easier for all of us.

Alternatively, make others transparent/water like effect. So they wont obscure our view. I’ve seen nasty remarks made to norns due to their size.

Challenge difficulty to remain as it is.

Suggestions is only for timed jumping group quest.

(btw, anyway to keep this available even after Halloween? I’m driven by achievements. I don’t care about the loot. I like to try them till I succeed, even if that means I have to somehow use a mouse)

First off, I want to say wow…a dev that comes in the thread and says, “hey ya know, it sucks that so many didn’t like it and I feel for you.” is a big deal lately. I appreciate that you understand the frustration of so many.

I thought the clocktower puzzle was super cool, however I did give up as this was a limited time event and there were other things I wanted to get done. I could not spend hours on end trying to get ONE extra achievement before they were all gone.

I just don’t think something this difficult is something to put in a holiday event is all. Something like this out there, maybe even a little harder, that the average user can dedicate time over the course of much more time outside the holiday events would be great, but in a limited time event, it was just too much for people that couldn’t spend 4-10 hours trying to get up there.

And what’s this about “first chest”. There was a chest not at the top I couldn’t even get to? Well that’s just fantastic…..sigh

I can do this multiple times even with bigass norn characters blocking my view. I know my posting here defeats the purpose of the thread, but I just like to clarify that I LOVE the clocktower. It’s challenging, and once you know how (after obviously after some practice), it’s not that hard anymore. Please do more of these jumping puzzles anet, they’re amazing!

The game has more stuff to do, keep stuff like this for me, and people like me, to enjoy.

To Josh:

I understand the feeling – I’m a bit of a bleeding heart myself and have known what it’s like to build something that I thought was great and that others would love, only to have it turn out not quite like I thought and a vocal group of folks loudly let me know about it.

I do want you to know, though, that the Clocktower is the most fun I have ever had in this game.

This is not hyperbole: It took me six hours to learn and memorize the pattern on Friday night on one character, and on Saturday, I parked a second character – one I’d barely used before – in the clocktower and I rarely had her leave the instance from that morning onward.

Since then, I clocked over 24 hours of running the clocktower repeatedly for thrills and for ToT bags. I loved it. I had so many interesting encounters with other players and did all sorts of random things, from between-round brawls to roleplaying to cheering each other on to hiding behind the chest and popping out to surprise them as they finally reached the top.

This instance is my absolute favorite and I will be very sad that it’ll be gone before I get home from work today. It makes me sadder, though, to think you regret it in any way, because I thought it was brilliant and so much fun. Please don’t feel down about it.

I’ve got to say that I loved the tower!

Because of having to study during this weeks I’ve not been able to play much but got my silvary character waiting every time I loged in the tower map. I still got her trying to finish the puzzle and I’ll try it until I got kicked out from the game.

I’m a really bad jumper, but found myself getting more and more far each day I tried.
I’ll say I’ve been about 4h trying it, without success, but I prefer difficult things to easy ones.

I would suggest, for future time-consuming events like this one, some kind of reward.
Maybe a personal trick bag it would have been nice each time you tried the map, or reach a certain part of it.

This was the first jumping puzzle I had done in the game (although I have dome some vistas, but those are nothing in comparison) to the clock tower. It took me over 8 hours to complete on my female Norn, and it was an exhilarating moment. Not only that, but I went back to play it some more after taking a break. I had fun just about every second of it. Sure, I was cussing up a storm, but I was enjoying it. Even more so after completing it and the pressure was off my shoulders to get the achievement points for it.

In that regards, I had absolutely no preparation for the puzzle. In fact, when the puzzle started, I was one of those “Where do I go?” and I didn’t move my character and was immediately engulfed by the green goo. I did that twice, before noticing other players jumping up the stairs and that it was timed. Literally, I had no preparation.

And I was just fine with it. I loved being able to learn how to do this jumping puzzle, and it’s kind of prepared me for any future jumping puzzles I want to do in the game. I “mastered” the space and w key, I’ve experimented with camera angles, etc. Going in blind really opened my eyes to some game features I didn’t know was available. Even something as simple as disabling double tap, or hiding the UI. I loved it!

I also really like having other players. I wish that there was a smaller amount of players in each round (like 5-7), but I do like having people to talk to between the rounds, being able to ask for advise on certain sections, cheering others on who are having difficulty, etc. It was a great learning/meeting opportunity. In fact, I met a couple people from different servers through there. We all had something in common: our desire to finish this difficult, but fun puzzle.

I’m an inexperienced jumper, I had no idea what I was doing, no preparation, etc… and I still loved it. This is a jumping puzzle… I want my hand held when figuring out things like Mad Memories. But when it comes to something like this, I want to learn by myself. Thanks, Josh!

@ Focksbot

That’s true for some things but not this puzzle. There’s nothing to be confused about or any way to be unaware of what you’re supposed to do. You enter a jumping puzzle and literally all you can do is keep going forwards and jumping or you fail it and go back to the start. They can’t make that clearer.

It’s not a valid comparison to compare the clock tower to things like unresponsive controls. My pet’s F2 skills are unresponsive – that’s Anet’s fault and I await a fix. If I get stressed and grumpy because I can’t finish a puzzle that’s my fault.

As for most players liking a challenge as long as it’s clear what they must do, well that’s debatable either way without statistics. I’ve seen plenty of people rage quitting dungeons and raids on the first wipe and that was not because they lacked instructions or ways to measure progress.

About this part of your reply to someone else:

“You’ve been coddled just enough to feel comfortable with an increased level of challenge. The only difference is preparation. You wouldn’t feel this way if the nature of the puzzle was new to you – you’d be on here saying it made no sense and was unfair etc.”

Not true. I haven’t played platform games since I was a kid, but I remember when they were new to me. I didn’t play much in the way of PC platform games, but the first one was the original Prince of Persia (on a floppy disk). That game had no qualms about suddenly killing you with traps. I died a lot at first but I just kept playing because I was determined to finish it.

As an aside, I would also like to add, as someone else mentioned, mouse turning versus keyboard turning probably makes a world of difference. I am not sure how someone could keyboard turn and do the puzzle, because with the mouse you can turn instantly versus the gradual keyboard turn.

That’s not so much a skill issue as it is reteaching one’s self a different way. When I switched many years ago it was very uncomfortable and took a long time. Now, though, it makes stuff much easier.

Focksbot.6798:

Criminon.8432:

Josh, you did the right thing. Seriously. There will always be people who complain. It’s very rare these days to come across something that is challenging, yet fun.

Nope, he’s taking the right lesson from it. You guys begging him to stop have got nothing to back you up – he’s not saying he’s not going to make challenging events in the future, but he recognises that throwing people in at the deep end was a mistake, and that making a significant proportion of your playerbase feel frustrated is not something to be proud of.

The problem with your POV and that of others swarming this thread to say, “No, it was great!” is that you fail to recognise that everything you liked about this puzzle can be accomplished whilst still giving an opportunity for other people to get to grips with it. Obviously, not everyone likes everything, but there are ways to design games and games-within-games so that the majority of players can get something out of them.

‘Difficulty’ isn’t some quantitative concept, where making something more accessible necessitates removing the challenge for others. It’s about ‘arming’ your players equally, so that those coming to something new or with less experience of certain systems can get up to speed with those who are seasoned, and those who don’t have as much time to waste can still get something out of an event, while those who have all the time in the world can find a proportionate increase in reward.

So please stop treating it like an oppositional binary. My hope is that Josh and ANet have the wisdom to see this as a problem that requires a creative solution, rather than a supposed choice between pleasing two different types of player.

There are several other jump puzzles located in the game to “get them up to speed”. It’s a jump puzzle. There are many jump puzzles. They didn’t throw anyone through a loop. They made a halloween jump puzzle. That’s it. They didn’t make it necessary for a title. They didn’t make it mandatory. They put it in the game and people complained. The boots you get at the end can be purchased off the TP. Nothing was gained from it. My creative solution would be to blast people like you off the planet.

Josh Foreman.

Don’t feel bad at all about the amazing map you made. I admit, I gave up not out of frustration or anger at the creators, because quite frankly I think the clock tower is outstanding, but because my reflexes and depth perception just isn’t up to par. So yes, I gave up but every now and then I go back and try again just for the FUN of it

So, don’t let the responses here get you down. You did an AMAZING job on the clock tower, and I look forward to the next treats you and the rest of the developers bring for the future.

Thank you if no one has said it yet. THANK YOU!

Josh Foreman.8250:

Aurelian Omenkind.2470:

Tried 4 or 5 times, then said “nope, I’m’a farm some more candy corns.” Been happy since.

When I made this map I was HOPING that people who aren’t into jumping would do exactly this. They’d see a fun Halloween looking environment, maybe get to the first chest and snag a goodie, then be on their merry way. I see now it was a mistake to make the hardest jumping challenge in the game part of an in-your-face update like a holiday event. I’m not going to stop making difficult stuff like this, they just won’t be so prominent in the future. I honestly hate making people upset and have a very high level of empathy. So it’s been hard hearing all the people that are so angry, frustrated and sad because of something I’ve made. But it’s just another lesson learned.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME!? Why would you apologize!? It took me 8 times without a guide on the internet to solve the puzzle, through mistakes you learn and the great thing is that it’s repeatable so fast that you cannot be annoyed really!

PLEASE PLEASE Make more puzzles that are HARDER in difficulty! And the joy must be longer! I loved your puzzle! I love it so much that I do it atleast several times a day just for the rush!

Best. Ingame. Feature.

EVER!

Period.

sonicsix.5713:

Whenever I am asked about the quality of this Halloween event, the FIRST thing that comes to mind is the horrid clock tower. It completely overshadows the other aspects of the event, which were actually fun.

So from now on, when I see an announcement for a new “fun” holiday event, my first thought will be “oh crap, I hope there isn’t another clock tower fiasco like that Halloween event”.

I’m sorry you feel that way. If you hate sports and you go to the mall, is the first thing on your mind the horrid sports store? When people ask you about the mall, instead of mentioning the delicious pretzels, do you instead think of the sports store?

If they build a new mall down the road do you say to your friends “God, I hope they don’t put in another sports store. I just can’t have fun in a mall with all the different stores if they have a sports store there.”

Stop thinking like that, please. You had many other fun things to do for halloween, and just because you didn’t like one of the events doesn’t mean everyone hated them. The more negative comments like this, the more likely it is that I get to see less of the things I enjoy.

I didn’t like reapers rumble. I hated it honestly. But I’m not complaining about it. I know other people enjoyed it, and although I thought it was crap, there were plenty of other things to keep me entertained. I had a blast with the survivor mini game, and the clocktower. So please, be grateful for what you got. It’s not every day that you come across an MMO willing to dedicate so much to just a holiday event, and I don’t want to see each one met with nothing but negativity. I really enjoyed the clocktower, but I wouldn’t even say it overshadowed the other events. I see them all as a whole, and as a whole it was an amazing month. I had a lot of fun, and I can’t wait to see what’s next.

Kana.6793:

@ Focksbot

That’s true for some things but not this puzzle. There’s nothing to be confused about or any way to be unaware of what you’re supposed to do. You enter a jumping puzzle and literally all you can do is keep going forwards and jumping or you fail it and go back to the start. They can’t make that clearer.

It’s not a valid comparison to compare the clock tower to things like unresponsive controls. My pet’s F2 skills are unresponsive – that’s Anet’s fault and I await a fix. If I get stressed and grumpy because I can’t finish a puzzle that’s my fault.

As for most players liking a challenge as long as it’s clear what they must do, well that’s debatable either way without statistics. I’ve seen plenty of people rage quitting dungeons and raids on the first wipe and that was not because they lacked instructions or ways to measure progress.

Kana, we should be friends.

Please, do not give up on making difficult challenges like this. It’s not a critical part of completing the main game, but I don’t believe Guild Wars 2 should shy away from it. Bring back the weekly time rankings as there was in Guild Wars Nightfall, take away the achievement and any end reward. Teach the audience that when they see this formula, the challenge is not necessary, but can be fun.

Kana.6793:

@ Focksbot

That’s true for some things but not this puzzle. There’s nothing to be confused about or any way to be unaware of what you’re supposed to do. You enter a jumping puzzle and literally all you can do is keep going forwards and jumping or you fail it and go back to the start. They can’t make that clearer.

You’re thinking too literally about the nature of challenges. As I said before, I have friends who literally sit down in front of a 3D game and become frustrated with controlling the character. It doesn’t feel intuitive to them at all. You can say, “Look, it’s obvious – foward, back, left, right”, but the brain doesn’t build its connections by logic alone – it needs experience. We take it for granted that it’s easy, but you and me have been playing games for years.

Similarly, although visually the puzzle is a simple case of “Keep jumping rock to rock”, in reality, you have to be comfortable with:

• The particular vagaries of terrain in this game, what slant constitutes a surface you slide off and what can be stood on.
• The collision detection, which knocks you off things when your foot clips them at the wrong angle, but often lets you stand up right on tiny, angled areas.
• The way the camera reacts to being put in a particular place, and how the directional controls change depending on where the camera is swinging (this still surprises me a lot, many hours into the game).
• Reading your model through other models.
• How holding/letting for of W affects the distance you jump.
• How much of the goo touching you means the game is ended.
• The sudden shifts to and from loading screens before and after the challenge.

Not being used to any of these things confuses and frustrates the player. Why did I miss that rock? How can I go forward when this pole appears too thin? Where can I jump to? Do I wait here? Can I afford to wait a second to line myself up? Where am I? Wait, it’s started already?? In normal jumping puzzles, you have a long time to calculate. This is the first one to demand you build up an instinct, and for many players, that’s a big ask.

It’s not a valid comparison to compare the clock tower to things like unresponsive controls. My pet’s F2 skills are unresponsive – that’s Anet’s fault and I await a fix. If I get stressed and grumpy because I can’t finish a puzzle that’s my fault.

Except the camera, controls and collision detection could all be greatly improved. My first feeling about the clocktower after a couple of attempts was: “Please give me Mario and a game controller so that I can do this properly. Or even Tomb Raider type controls.” Because those game engines are better in all these respects (even though TR is old and clunky, it’s still got a more stable camera and jump mechanic) but also, of course, because I’m used to the idiosyncrasies of those game engines.

Personally, I have no problem with the pet controls, because I’ve used them extensively and have learned to account for the delay.

As for most players liking a challenge as long as it’s clear what they must do, well that’s debatable either way without statistics. I’ve seen plenty of people rage quitting dungeons and raids on the first wipe and that was not because they lacked instructions or ways to measure progress.

Of course it’s debatable. Everything’s debatable. But as far as debates go, my instinct, based on research I’ve read and my familiarity with lots of different types of people, is that we aren’t so different that there’s a split right down the playerbase representing people who ‘like a challenge’ and people who ‘need to be coddled’. I think it’s highly insulting to the latter. All the research points to the conclusion that games attract players because they put you in a ‘zone’ where you feel you’re being tested and challenged but see the possibility of success while understanding the nature of failure. I think it’s called ‘fiero’ – a state of total concentration. I don’t believe that anyone likes things to be ‘easy’, but things inevitably become easy once we’re used to them. So games like GW2 have the tricky job of trying to bring players who are used to certain mechanics and players who are new to them together in the same arena without frustrating some and boring others.

@Josh Foreman: There is nothing to be sorry for. It was an amazing jump puzzle that took nearly everyone an hour+ to overcome. It was challenging and gave a sense of satisfaction upon completion. One of the most joys I’ve ever had in a PvE environment. Thanks for making it and please don’t let anyone here deter you from making something as awesome in the future.

as a hint on how much i loved the puzzle…..i completed it over 200 times in the span of a few hours.

Focksbot.6798:

@ Focksbot

Of course it’s debatable. Everything’s debatable. But as far as debates go, my instinct, based on research I’ve read and my familiarity with lots of different types of people, is that we aren’t so different that there’s a split right down the playerbase representing people who ‘like a challenge’ and people who ‘need to be coddled’. I think it’s highly insulting to the latter. All the research points to the conclusion that games attract players because they put you in a ‘zone’ where you feel you’re being tested and challenged but see the possibility of success while understanding the nature of failure. I think it’s called ‘fiero’ – a state of total concentration. I don’t believe that anyone likes things to be ‘easy’, but things inevitably become easy once we’re used to them. So games like GW2 have the tricky job of trying to bring players who are used to certain mechanics and players who are new to them together in the same arena without frustrating some and boring others.

Then it’s a good thing the clocktower wasn’t mandatory, right? It was put there for people to enjoy. I believe someone mentioned that they only expected 5% of people to even complete it. No one told them they had to play it.

It’s a small part of the game, it was a small part of the halloween event, just stop trying to ruin something that was really great. You’re doing a really good job at defending the idea that the clocktower in some way was done incorrectly, but at the same time you still have nothing to go off of. There isn’t a point in pushing for a change.

They gave us a halloween event with multiple things to do for every type of player. Two mini games. Two Mad Memories events. A jump puzzle. A dungeon. A finale event, etc. There is no need to pick apart all of these. Just be happy that so much content was given. I’m sure something about this event made you super happy, and you agreed with. Why not promote that instead of belittling something that made a lot of people happy?

Dear Josh Foreman,

I have logged in from my station at work at the risk of my job in order to tell you to PLEASE KEEP DOING WHAT YOU ARE DOING. I can’t stress how amazing the Clocktower was. From what I read, most of the frustration came from the fact that it was originally designed for single players so players were only mad because it wasn’t used the way it was originally intended. Therefore the Cry of Frustration Anet cast on us was due to technical issues alone, not your design.

To clarify my concern, I’m not so much afraid that these outcries will bring about easier content but that the quality of future content might be compromised due to the fear of another public outlash. The whole halloween event was amazing and the Clocktower was at the center of it all. As you and your team were passionate about designing this level so were the people who played it, and passion is not without both love and hate; afterall they are two sides to a single coin.

Sincerely,

Devoted Guild Wars Fan

P.S.
You’ve unlocked an achievment…

Criminon.8432:

There are several other jump puzzles located in the game to “get them up to speed”. It’s a jump puzzle. There are many jump puzzles.

As I say above, they don’t do an adequate job, because they can all be solved first time by analysis, which means going at your own pace.

Asking people to develop an instinct for a jump puzzle is a huge leap. I’ve played dozens of platformers in the past with puzzles that are just as hard, and I’ve also played GW2 for 80+ hours now, and the combination of those experiences made me look at the clocktower and think, “OK, I can probably do this, but I’ll spend the whole time pleading inwardly for controls I’m more used to, and I can’t spare the time between now and next week.” I still find the GW2 controls in general rather unresponsive and weird, but I put up with it because you can usually take things slowly, or feel a sense of progress. I shudder to think how players must have felt coming to this puzzle without having much of a background in platformers, because that was something of a cushion for me, and I still felt I was effectively excluded by lacking the seven+ hours of free time.

yos.2401:

Good Puzzle. Horrendous implementation. There are too many things clashing together to make this puzzle make me want to break something.

I’m not complaining that the puzzle is hard, like is the vocal majority on this post. I am saying that there are too many things about the puzzle that when they get stuck together it works out badly.

1. Group play – Problem being that you can’t see your footing and its very distracting.
2. Rushed play – The ground coming up at you so if you’re not the quickest at turning or jumping you get eaten from behind.
3. Sporatic play – You have to wait, and wait, and wait, and wait, until the last person is done from the group.
4. Limited play – It won’t be here tomorrow, but there is an Achievement for doing it (I collect Achievements as much as I can).

When all four of these things are added together, it is VERY STRESSFUL for a large populous. That’s just the reading from the people inside the groups I was in and assuming based off the posts here.

Take any 1 of those 4 points away, and in all likelihood the puzzle would keep its challenge but not be as stressful.

A challenging puzzle like this would be amazing, even with the groups/rush/waits, if it wasn’t limited to a holiday. Who knows if it will be around next time Halloween comes around, I know many games like to mix things up with their celebrations. So now I am stuck with an unfulfilled achievement, that may or may not ever get to be done again, all because of having to have a life outside of gw2 (work, sleep, etc). That bothers me a lot.

Otherwise, I’m pretty sure there would be a lot less complaining if the puzzle was solo (less ability to blame on others, but they are freaking distracting). Or if we didn’t have to constantly wait between falls (ruins whatever rhythm may have been going, and just wasted time since nothing else is going on); if you’re worried about farmers or bots, just put a timer on it, or make the dungeon loot code effect it. Getting rid of the rush would definitely make the puzzle easier, something that could be done in the span of the events without taking over all the time you have to do all the events.

That being said, I had fun for a bit, then had to quit before I broke something. I hope there is a chance to try again.

---

P.S.
To the people comparing this to old platformers, this puzzle would be like a 3-5day rental of super mario brothers that forced you to restart the entire world when you died, and made you sit and wait after you died until the average time it took the beta testers to finish each world. Sure, some of you would be good enough to beat that without dying so you wouldn’t realize the pain that others would go through, but for the rest of us, it would be a trying experience that might end in a broken controller.

Well said. And when you throw in the number of people griefing others and the technical glitches like random resets, camera issues, and lag coming out of the cutscene voiding entire runs, it gets really frustrating. Nice idea, good visual design and music, poor implementation. Coupled with the network errors when trying to change instances in a group and the apparent broken overflow queueing, I question how well this was tested once it was changed to a group event.

apologize seriously dont needed, clocktower was perfect. It’s really worth the name it carries " Jumpin’ Puzzle "

Don’t say you are sorry for this. Grow a pair and tell your boss if he is making you do this to shove it up his kitten This was a good puzzle, by far the best one in the game. People just need to stop crying and learn how to not suck at jumping puzzles. Did this on a Charr, Human, and Asura, its hard yes, but not impossible. Suck it up people.

MechaBlue.2843:

Dear Josh Foreman,

I have logged in from my station at work at the risk of my job in order to tell you to PLEASE KEEP DOING WHAT YOU ARE DOING. I can’t stress how amazing the Clocktower was. From what I read, most of the frustration came from the fact that it was originally designed for single players so players were only mad because it wasn’t used the way it was originally intended. Therefore the Cry of Frustration Anet cast on us was due to technical issues alone, not your design.

To clarify my concern, I’m not so much afraid that these outcries will bring about easier content but that the quality of future content might be compromised due to the fear of another public outlash. The whole halloween event was amazing and the Clocktower was at the center of it all. As you and your team were passionate about designing this level so were the people who played it, and passion is not without both love and hate; afterall they are two sides to a single coin.

Sincerely,

Devoted Guild Wars Fan

P.S.
You’ve unlocked an achievment…

Well said, well said indeed.

Just signed in to say that I absolutely loved the clock tower. Yes it was challenging, but that just makes it all the more rewarding to actually beat it. Please, please, PLEASE do not pander to the players that need everything spoon fed to them.

[quote=606443;Criminon.8432:]

Then it’s a good thing the clocktower wasn’t mandatory, right? It was put there for people to enjoy. I believe someone mentioned that they only expected 5% of people to even complete it. No one told them they had to play it.

Yet again, I suspect Josh understands the problem with this statement, reading between the lines in his statement.

He understands that when you put a puzzle like this in front of players as part of a big event, it’s a dare. It’s an invitation. It pulls people in. In the context of the game, it was put in the wrong place for most players in the span of their play experience. It’s simply good game design to place difficult challenges in places where you can expect players to come to it prepared. That’s the philosophy for much of GW2 and it only makes sense to keep it consistent.

So there is a point in pushing for a change, and again, I say Josh has taken the right lesson from it. I respect both his skill as a designer and his insight in understanding that the nature of the mistake wasn’t a case of ‘too hard’ versus ‘too easy’, but the context in which you place certain challenges.

Your analysis of the nature of choice and freedom is one I see all over these forums, and with respect, it’s misguided – or it would be if you were applying it practically. Go into business or art, or a combination of the two, and carry on with an attitude of “It’s the customer’s/reader’s/player’s fault if they don’t choose to ignore things that I offer to them that they find overwhelming” and I really doubt you’ll succeed.

Despite the difficulty and time it took I did kind of enjoy it. The worst part was that pause where everyone grouped up, it made it really hard to consistently make the jumps right after with enough speed to not fail.

I did the jumping puzzle on 4 characters and my friends character. He couldn’t do it because of work and time constraints. I loved the tower, but I think some of the debris and the camera in the beginning when the tower side breaks out are the real reason so many people are having issues. Once you get passed that it is tough, but not frustratingly so.

Focksbot.6798:

Criminon.8432:

There are several other jump puzzles located in the game to “get them up to speed”. It’s a jump puzzle. There are many jump puzzles.

As I say above, they don’t do an adequate job, because they can all be solved first time by analysis, which means going at your own pace.

Asking people to develop an instinct for a jump puzzle is a huge leap. I’ve played dozens of platformers in the past with puzzles that are just as hard, and I’ve also played GW2 for 80+ hours now, and the combination of those experiences made me look at the clocktower and think, “OK, I can probably do this, but I’ll spend the whole time pleading inwardly for controls I’m more used to, and I can’t spare the time between now and next week.” I still find the GW2 controls in general rather unresponsive and weird, but I put up with it because you can usually take things slowly, or feel a sense of progress. I shudder to think how players must have felt coming to this puzzle without having much of a background in platformers, because that was something of a cushion for me, and I still felt I was effectively excluded by lacking the seven+ hours of free time.

So this is basically you being upset because you wanted to do something in the game and you weren’t able to? Do you feel sad because you didn’t complete it? You seem to have a lot of time to type in the forums, yet you state that you don’t have enough time to do it in game.

The halloween events have been going on for quite some time. If it bothers you this much to spend all this time in the forum, how about spent it positively. Watch a youtube video of the puzzle. Log on and do an hour a day. 30 minutes a day. And try to improve. Don’t waste your time here on the forums stating that it’s bad for most players. Encourage them to get better and help them to understand how to do it.

One of the greatest things about Guild Wars 2 is the community. Be a part of that good community and help others instead of blaming it on Anet. Anet did everything perfectly. They presented a challenge, and as a community we should all help each other to overcome it.

Yes, the rest of the jump puzzles in Gw2 don’t have a timer for completion. You are rushed in this puzzle, but this was new for me as well. I have never speed jumped puzzles before, and I’ve been doing it for a long time. It was a fun, new experience.

Either you learn to do something, or you give up. If others can complete it, then that means you can too, given you devote enough time to it. If you don’t have the time to devote to it, don’t blame the people who created it.

Criminon.8432:

sonicsix.5713:

Whenever I am asked about the quality of this Halloween event, the FIRST thing that comes to mind is the horrid clock tower. It completely overshadows the other aspects of the event, which were actually fun.

So from now on, when I see an announcement for a new “fun” holiday event, my first thought will be “oh crap, I hope there isn’t another clock tower fiasco like that Halloween event”.

I’m sorry you feel that way. If you hate sports and you go to the mall, is the first thing on your mind the horrid sports store? When people ask you about the mall, instead of mentioning the delicious pretzels, do you instead think of the sports store?

If they build a new mall down the road do you say to your friends “God, I hope they don’t put in another sports store. I just can’t have fun in a mall with all the different stores if they have a sports store there.”

Stop thinking like that, please. You had many other fun things to do for halloween, and just because you didn’t like one of the events doesn’t mean everyone hated them. The more negative comments like this, the more likely it is that I get to see less of the things I enjoy.

I didn’t like reapers rumble. I hated it honestly. But I’m not complaining about it. I know other people enjoyed it, and although I thought it was crap, there were plenty of other things to keep me entertained. I had a blast with the survivor mini game, and the clocktower. So please, be grateful for what you got. It’s not every day that you come across an MMO willing to dedicate so much to just a holiday event, and I don’t want to see each one met with nothing but negativity. I really enjoyed the clocktower, but I wouldn’t even say it overshadowed the other events. I see them all as a whole, and as a whole it was an amazing month. I had a lot of fun, and I can’t wait to see what’s next.

Your analogy is flawed. Mr. Foreman and company have bolted these miserable jump puzzles onto EVERYTHING without a way to avoid them, other than just skipping the area/event. To use your sports store analogy, GW2 is like going to the mall but only being allowed in if you go into every sports store there first. They are roadblocks to access rather than complementary content in that there are no alternatives to it….

Want the Exploration achievement, gotta do jump puzzles. Want to take part in an entire act of the Halloween event, more jump puzzles. I don’t begrudge the twitch-monkies their arcade fix, its the UNAVOIDABLE and NO ALTERNATIVE setup. I have no problem with the chest jump puzzles like Caledon Forest, but resent the KITTEN out of the ones to get to POI’s, some skill challenges and events….because they have no alternative method of completion for the non-arcade players.

Mr. Foreman and other ‘I love jump puzzles!’ players / devs need to remember that ALL ages and ALL physical status players play the game….not just young twitch gamers. Some gamers CANNOT do the jump content…no amount of trying over, no amout of ‘other places in the game to learn to do jump puzzles’ (I paraphrase another user here) will enable them to do the jump puzzles. An alternative method of completion or keeping the jumping puzzles as stand alones that can be skipped without losing titles or skipping entire acts of events is all I and others are asking for.

And thank you, Mr. Foreman, for displaying the ability to see the issue from different points of view. Devs in most games go silent at criticism and post only to the echo chamber of fanboy praise. A balanced approach is a welcome sight

I love clocktower , please ignore all crying ppl , dont change nothing and make more hard puzzle like this in the Future , keep up great job man!

Focksbot.6798:

Then it’s a good thing the clocktower wasn’t mandatory, right? It was put there for people to enjoy. I believe someone mentioned that they only expected 5% of people to even complete it. No one told them they had to play it.

Yet again, I suspect Josh understands the problem with this statement, reading between the lines in his statement.

He understands that when you put a puzzle like this in front of players as part of a big event, it’s a dare. It’s an invitation. It pulls people in. In the context of the game, it was put in the wrong place for most players in the span of their play experience. It’s simply good game design to place difficult challenges in places where you can expect players to come to it prepared. That’s the philosophy for much of GW2 and it only makes sense to keep it consistent.

So there is a point in pushing for a change, and again, I say Josh has taken the right lesson from it. I respect both his skill as a designer and his insight in understanding that the nature of the mistake wasn’t a case of ‘too hard’ versus ‘too easy’, but the context in which you place certain challenges.

Your analysis of the nature of choice and freedom is one I see all over these forums, and with respect, it’s misguided – or it would be if you were applying it practically. Go into business or art, or a combination of the two, and carry on with an attitude of “It’s the customer’s/reader’s/player’s fault if they don’t choose to ignore things that I offer to them that they find overwhelming” and I really doubt you’ll succeed.

Rock climbing is a challenge. I don’t think I want to ever do it. But you don’t see me hating on it. Look at guild wars 2 the way you look at the world. There are tons of things to do in it, but you don’t have to do everything. Some people do, and those people are crazy kittenes.

I hope they post stats about what % of accounts finished it, since his aim was 5%.

This probably sounds very fangirlish, but I honestly don’t care.

Even though I did not complete the JP, it was one of the most impressive features this Halloween, and I love it for that. It was memorable, challenging, fun (even though I died a lot), and did I mention memorable?
The Inquisition was my favorite feature to do, but the jumping puzzle was awe-inspiring. I admire everyone who managed to finish it

i didnt finish it and Im not mad about it. it was interesting and was just too tough for me.

I absolutely LOVED the clock tower…it was a genuine sense of achievement, rather than just another sequence of events to get through.

Would people be less upset if the clocktower was a bonus achievement rather than a requirement for the seasonal event completion?

I ended up addicted to it and couldn’t stop running it. I’m really looking forward to more puzzles like this one! Keep up the good work.

Reading Josh’s posts here has me feeling hopeful, happy that voices here are being heard.

I love the jumping puzzles being in the game though I haven’t done many ( if any that I can remember since I’m still new with the game )…but they are just another interesting thing to check out at least once or twice.

With that said, though I liked the atmosphere and layout of the clocktower, I tried two or three times ( and failing at the same part each time ) when I decided that I have to step back and find something else to do before my anxiety and stress got bad. The way you have to control your character and camera angles ( and having issues with folks that are of other sizes that can get in the way ) got me feeling anxious. It’s not that I’m a quitter…but right now, I’m seeing a psych counselor and one of her biggest rules for me right now is that if I start to feel stressed with something, then leave it alone. No matter what. Even if you’re happy with it…stress is bad for me especially right now.

I’m not meaning to seem negative but wanted to put in my thoughts and where I’m coming from at this point.

Maklin.9301:

Criminon.8432:

sonicsix.5713:

Whenever I am asked about the quality of this Halloween event, the FIRST thing that comes to mind is the horrid clock tower. It completely overshadows the other aspects of the event, which were actually fun.

So from now on, when I see an announcement for a new “fun” holiday event, my first thought will be “oh crap, I hope there isn’t another clock tower fiasco like that Halloween event”.

I’m sorry you feel that way. If you hate sports and you go to the mall, is the first thing on your mind the horrid sports store? When people ask you about the mall, instead of mentioning the delicious pretzels, do you instead think of the sports store?

If they build a new mall down the road do you say to your friends “God, I hope they don’t put in another sports store. I just can’t have fun in a mall with all the different stores if they have a sports store there.”

Stop thinking like that, please. You had many other fun things to do for halloween, and just because you didn’t like one of the events doesn’t mean everyone hated them. The more negative comments like this, the more likely it is that I get to see less of the things I enjoy.

I didn’t like reapers rumble. I hated it honestly. But I’m not complaining about it. I know other people enjoyed it, and although I thought it was crap, there were plenty of other things to keep me entertained. I had a blast with the survivor mini game, and the clocktower. So please, be grateful for what you got. It’s not every day that you come across an MMO willing to dedicate so much to just a holiday event, and I don’t want to see each one met with nothing but negativity. I really enjoyed the clocktower, but I wouldn’t even say it overshadowed the other events. I see them all as a whole, and as a whole it was an amazing month. I had a lot of fun, and I can’t wait to see what’s next.

Your analogy is flawed. Mr. Foreman and company have bolted these miserable jump puzzles onto EVERYTHING without a way to avoid them, other than just skipping the area/event. To use your sports store analogy, GW2 is like going to the mall but only being allowed in if you go into every sports store there first. They are roadblocks to access rather than complementary content in that there are no alternatives to it….

Want the Exploration achievement, gotta do jump puzzles. Want to take part in an entire act of the Halloween event, more jump puzzles. I don’t begrudge the twitch-monkies their arcade fix, its the UNAVOIDABLE and NO ALTERNATIVE setup. I have no problem with the chest jump puzzles like Caledon Forest, but resent the KITTEN out of the ones to get to POI’s, some skill challenges and events….because they have no alternative method of completion for the non-arcade players.

Mr. Foreman and other ‘I love jump puzzles!’ players / devs need to remember that ALL ages and ALL physical status players play the game….not just young twitch gamers. Some gamers CANNOT do the jump content…no amount of trying over, no amout of ‘other places in the game to learn to do jump puzzles’ (I paraphrase another user here) will enable them to do the jump puzzles. An alternative method of completion or keeping the jumping puzzles as stand alones that can be skipped without losing titles or skipping entire acts of events is all I and others are asking for.

And thank you, Mr. Foreman, for displaying the ability to see the issue from different points of view. Devs in most games go silent at criticism and post only to the echo chamber of fanboy praise. A balanced approach is a welcome sight

We’re talking about the halloween event here. You didn’t have to do the jump puzzle to access any of the halloween events or mini games. So your statement is pretty invalid.

In regards to your complaint about map completion, no one is making you complete the map. There are several other things for you to do in the game. Most people complete the map to get legendaries. Most people that get legendaries are dedicated to the game.

Jump puzzles are learned. ANYONE can learn to do them, given enough time and training. That’s like saying there are some people that can’t work at burger king.

Rock climbing is a challenge. I don’t think I want to ever do it. But you don’t see me hating on it. Look at guild wars 2 the way you look at the world. There are tons of things to do in it, but you don’t have to do everything. Some people do, and those people are crazy kittenes.

Imagine in the real world there was a bar above your head and everything unique you did filled it a little more, and when it’s full, you’ll get a small reward. One day you find out you need to go rock climbing to fill it up completely.

Still feel it’s a completely free choice?

Psychology is odd. We all tend not to weight things up rationally. Gaming capitalises on how responsive we are to things like getting a full quota of ticks, getting a 100% score and lots of other things. It’s a wonderful motivating factor that could be tapped into to make us more productive in real life.

But it also makes it not a simple case of take-it-or-leave-it. I’m not talking specifically about the Halloween achievement here – I’m talking about how games like GW2 inspire a completionist urge in much of their player base. We feel a sense of ‘progress’ from ticking things off the list. Having sections of the game that practically exclude us because of time investment or too much, too soon is simply bad tactics. Rationally or not, players will feel it’s bait and switch – you made them feel they could complete everything over time and then you decided: actually, no.

Devata.6589:

I always find the ‘elitism’ discussions a bid funny if it is about MMORPG games. Really, the whole game is about it, or you totally don’t care about it.

The games allows you to do your thing and don’t mind what other people are doing. If you play like that ‘elitism’ should not be a problem for you.

You can also use the game to really get the best chars or the coolest mini’s and so on. Some people say thats elitism. Well then I am an elitism but I am not the guy with the biggest armor showing it of in LA. I just like to have so unique stuff.

It’s not problem if these sort of activities ‘block’ content (like you name it) It makes that content just more epic. So you like that content (be an elitism?) and go for it of you don’t care and ignore it. It is as simple as that.

With ‘content’ I am mostly referring to items, not basic things like world-completion.

I apologize, I am not really understanding what you are trying to say. I am thinking there’s a bit of a language barrier between us.
You took the time to reply directly, so I didn’t want to seem rude and not at least say I read your reply – so, letting you know I did. Thanks

If I am guessing what you are meaning; we may also have a different meaning of an elitist. A person that is “showing” off their hard earned goods is not someone I would call an elitist. However, someone that is insulting or downputting of a fellow gamer(s) when they are unable to complete certain content; and then goes out of their way to exclude that person or persons from a potential group is what I would call an elitist and a toxic player to the community.

I personally go out of my way and says “congrats” to my fellow gamers when I see them with hard earned or extremely rare items. However, when I see other players throwing out insults towards other players cause (for whatever reason) they are unable to complete something; yeah… ugh. Toxic.
Gated content like this in key areas, dungeons, vistas, skill points etc would be a breeding ground for such immature and toxic behavior. That is my concern.

Anyway, hope I didn’t completely misread or misunderstand what you were saying.

Focksbot.6798:

Rock climbing is a challenge. I don’t think I want to ever do it. But you don’t see me hating on it. Look at guild wars 2 the way you look at the world. There are tons of things to do in it, but you don’t have to do everything. Some people do, and those people are crazy kittenes.

Imagine in the real world there was a bar above your head and everything unique you did filled it a little more, and when it’s full, you’ll get a small reward. One day you find out you need to go rock climbing to fill it up completely.

Still feel it’s a completely free choice?

Psychology is odd. We all tend not to weight things up rationally. Gaming capitalises on how responsive we are to things like getting a full quota of ticks, getting a 100% score and lots of other things. It’s a wonderful motivating factor that could be tapped into to make us more productive in real life.

But it also makes it not a simple case of take-it-or-leave-it. I’m not talking specifically about the Halloween achievement here – I’m talking about how games like GW2 inspire a completionist urge in much of their player base. We feel a sense of ‘progress’ from ticking things off the list. Having sections of the game that practically exclude us because of time investment or too much, too soon is simply bad tactics. Rationally or not, players will feel it’s bait and switch – you made them feel they could complete everything over time and then you decided: actually, no.

You’re playing an MMO. If you don’t have a bit of time to invest, this probably isn’t the type of game for you. Yes, they stated that they didn’t want players to feel they had to log in constantly, but we are talking a couple hours of your time. I think you’re blowing this all out of proportion.

I think what made this puzzle so frustrating for most people isn’t that it is hard, but that there was a very limited window in which to complete it. If we knew it was going to stay around after the event, there wouldn’t have been as much urgency to complete it. Some people may not have even had a chance to try it.

I loved the design and atmosphere of the tower. It was very difficult, but doable if you are very persistent!