Guild Wars 2

In GW1, you could talk to an NPC and preview what your character could look like, and if you had a token, change to that right there.

Tt looks like GW2 does the opposite. You need to buy the makeover kit first, then you can use it to launch the makeover window. What if I just want to experiment and play around with different combinations? I have to buy a makeover kit anyways and waste an inventory slot storing it? This should be changed.

I bought both kits to get rid of my character’s stubble. Turns out it was part of the face texture and not changeable. Luckily I got gems back from my ticket but I think something closer to GW1 would save players and service agents a lot of trouble and disappointment.

Do research to make sure the kits can do the specific job.

I see three types of people when talking about makeover kits:
– Those that will never buy one. Ignore them for now.
– Those that will buy one under the current system. For this thread they can also be ignored.
– People who aren’t planning to buy kit but, if given the chance, will experiment with the preview option. Some of them will then decide to buy a kit after seeing what they can make their character look like.

So a preview system would sell more makeover kits. Thus it should be done.

I agree., Sleepwalker. You missed one demographic: the people who would buy them under the current system that end up being kinda screwed because the current system doesn’t include something they thought it did…. uh… yah… it doesn’t even matter. The demographic I just stated is ANOTHER reason the preview system would help sales. I know I won’t be buying another. And I’ll be warning my friends that the makeover kits cannot control certain things (like human skin texture/complexion).

Unpredictability.4086:

In GW1, you could talk to an NPC and preview what your character could look like, and if you had a token, change to that right there.

Tt looks like GW2 does the opposite. You need to buy the makeover kit first, then you can use it to launch the makeover window. What if I just want to experiment and play around with different combinations? I have to buy a makeover kit anyways and waste an inventory slot storing it? This should be changed.

I can really only see this being an issue if you have already filled up all your character slots with important alts.

There’s another similar feature I wanted that would solve your problem as well as provide extra functionality: the ability to “save” a character’s appearance during creation and then restore it at a later time — perhaps even to a different character during another creation process.

If you could do that, you could create a brand new character, save the appearance, walk it around the world, and then if you like it, restore that appearance onto your existing character with a kit. You could even start with your existing character as a base via a restore onto a new character.

NB: there’s no need even for extra server-side support for that feature. The save template could be saved locally as parameters for the various character appearance sliders and selections and then during restoration simply communicated to the server.

In addition to save/restore, I wish the appearance kit was not a one-shot permanent change, but gave you say 24H to fiddle with your character’s appearance. The creation window does a fair job of showing your character in a very limited set of ways. It’s very important to see that character in the game itself before deciding on a final appearance.

That a character looks or feels different in the game world than on the screen, after all, is one of the reasons that people want to change the appearance. That was the reason why I changed my Norn’s look. I wanted her to look more Norn-like — particularly to be taller. Relative height is something you can’t see at all on the creation window.

Omg I love the idea of saving character appearances. That’s a face book I’d sign up for.

Okuza.5210:

There’s another similar feature I wanted that would solve your problem as well as provide extra functionality: the ability to “save” a character’s appearance during creation and then restore it at a later time — perhaps even to a different character during another creation process.

If you could do that, you could create a brand new character, save the appearance, walk it around the world, and then if you like it, restore that appearance onto your existing character with a kit. You could even start with your existing character as a base via a restore onto a new character.

Only if you have a spare character slot. Also it doesn’t let you preview it with the armor and dyes you have obtained for the character you want to change.

NB: there’s no need even for extra server-side support for that feature.

The same goes for a preview feature.

I think they stopped short of the finish line on so many UI features with “well, this is good enough.” The UI could be phenomenally better with just a little more effort. Missing LFG tool, secure direct trade panel, trade chat channel, pan-server chat channels, etc. etc..

MMOs are inherently social and yet the game has only the barest rudimentary social supports. With 1→80 being almost entirely solo, lack of UI support for social features is almost crippling to game community.

Different issue, but neat segue to slip it in there, eh?

Okuza.5210:

I think they stopped short of the finish line on so many UI features with “well, this is good enough.” The UI could be phenomenally better with just a little more effort. Missing LFG tool, secure direct trade panel, trade chat channel, pan-server chat channels, etc. etc..

Leaving out a secure trade window was an intentional decision from ANET. They decided that the negatives of it outweighed any positives. Since I have never seen any other MMO that has killed trade spam as effectively as GW2 has, I agree with them.
With no trade window, all a trade chat would do is encourage people to be scammed by attempting to trade through mail, so a trade chat is also a bad idea.

The lack of a LFG tool is inexcusable.