Guild Wars 2

Im an amateur game designer. :>

And its windy here.

I am a game designer as well….

I like nachos.

Seems like a good place to leave this.

And the weather? Freakin’ hot. What the hell happened to spring this year?

Casmurro.9046:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jEAUIiD4DHw

This! It speaks louder than any of us. Re-quoted.

Casmurro.9046:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jEAUIiD4DHw

YES!
I hope any dev that ever reads my comments knows that my hate is NEVER intended for them. I <3 devs. They work their butts off to make something I enjoy. They are great. My hate always goes out to the metric hounds who put their thumbs down on the devs and make them work in ways that counter what I like.

I had the pleasure of working with one of the dev teams of a game I used to play. Basically a small player sounding board to bounce ideas off before they went to the general public. My view of devs was forever shaken for the better when I logged in before work one day to chat with a dev, came home from work and delved into a new system with him all evening till I went to bed while he was STILL IN THE OFFICE.

I do remember situations like “if we did this would it work” “nope because XYZ” that type of stuff. I thought it was a brilliant idea of SOE to implement this council. I think GW2’s Forum Specialisists is a first step towards that but not quite all the way. I literally got an inch thick NDA to sign when I did it, threatening hundreds of thousands of dollars if I broke it (of course I didn’t ) but it allowed them to freely share ideas with the players who were devout to their game. While I got some hate from players in general it was something much loved. Players knew they had a “fast track” to the devs for good ideas. And they knew they had a shield against bad ideas from the devs. When a dev wanted to do something like say… make Lupi’s projectile attacks hit in melee range, we’d fully flesh out all the repercussions of such an idea. Now if they decided to go through, that was on them, but we as players knew that they would be fully aware of the players opinions on such an act.

Point being, her points on transparency are 1200% true (typo, but I left it because it felt right). We as players want to know our feedback is heard. We want to know that more than just metrics shape the game. We want to know that things are advancing in a way that makes us want to play the kittening game.

I won’t for a second say I could develop games better than these people. I may do things differently. My vision in some circumstances may seem better to me, but we all have our biases and all miss different details. I give my props to Matt Lethargius(sorry if I screwed up your name) who is working on Engi, god some of the ideas are beyond what I’d have thought of, and if he balances them well, even more props!

I will say, players always have a different perspective than the devs. And the statement “devs are so out of touch” will ALWAYS hold true. Why? Because of a simple fact, that devs know how it’s SUPPOSED to work, players know how it works. Devs won’t look for that little niche situation of awesomeness, players will stumble upon it and abuse the ever living kitten out of it. So there’s that giant hurdle to jump over and I doubt any dev is able to completely overcome it, if one does, well we got a genius on our hands and he probably shouldn’t’ be working for a gaming company and instead be making millions doing something a bit more important. To take a quote from the video “it’s just video games”.

Either way, my point is basically, no hate towards any devs. I just wish they were allowed to work on what they do best to make the best game they could for us. Direction is necessary but there’s a point when company priorities step on the toes of the overall success of games, so please ANet stop strangling the creativity of your devs and let them make stuff we enjoy! I’ve yet to see a NGE type thing work, whether your research says it will or not, it doesn’t. Think of all the new stuff we could have gotten to help promote your game which was squashed by such an idea! God… Let them make cool stuff. Give me something I like and I’ll pull out my credit card. It’s not a difficult concept! Want $50 for a new game purchase, give me a kittening dungeon!!!! but even if that doesn’t happen, ANET for the love of god, let your devs talk to us! We have the player perspective, we will help them wherever we can, we want the game to improve just as much as any dev, and any dev I’m sure wants it to improve just as much as we do!

And that’s the end of myu drunken rambling for now Nice Video.

Obligatory plus one. Jerus is confirmed to have won the internet today.

Edit: He doesn’t seem drunk enough at this late hour either.

In all seriousness ANet should learn some lessons from GW1 dungeons.

1. Dungeon keys – so you actually have to derail and grab the key instead of just rushing to the end boss
2. Hidden chests all over the dungeon in random spots – so people have an incentive to go explore the place

They do have speedclear tactics in GW1 which pretty much means the same as in GW2 (except its actually more fun) but all those chests and keys leave the room for casual runners too. GW2 dungeons leave no room for casual runners or explorers – since the last boss is the only reward.

Jerus.4350:

Ugh, thanks for reminding me of SWG. Talk about ruining one of the best mmos (or at least one with the most potential and scope outside of the like of UO and perhaps EVE).

If you are talking about the Player Senate, it was a good idea that allowed for a decent link between the wider player base (those that interacted on the forums predominantly) and the devs via the representatives. But ofc, there were issues with it at the same time.

Skady.5916:

GW2 dungeons leave no room for casual runners or explorers – since the last boss is the only reward.

This wasn´t always the case if I remember correctly. In the (good) old CoF1-all-the-way days, before daily dungeon rewards were introduced, the gold reward was split up among all the bosses of a path. But it still didn´t reward exploring very much, probably because of the linear nature of most paths. People used to kill some extra champs here and there, but that´s about it.

To make exploring in dungeons a truly rewarding experience (and it really should be considering the paths are called “explorable” not “rushable” ) the devs basically would need to redesign every single path from scratch and that is just not a realistic thing to ask or expect from them.

Skady.5916:

In all seriousness ANet should learn some lessons from GW1 dungeons.

1. Dungeon keys – so you actually have to derail and grab the key instead of just rushing to the end boss
2. Hidden chests all over the dungeon in random spots – so people have an incentive to go explore the place

They do have speedclear tactics in GW1 which pretty much means the same as in GW2 (except its actually more fun) but all those chests and keys leave the room for casual runners too. GW2 dungeons leave no room for casual runners or explorers – since the last boss is the only reward.

You what now? If anything GW1 pro dungeoneers have perfected the art of skipping everything. Rushing to the end boss to get the final reward. Because they were not farming for hidden chests or some random stuff but for the 100 ecto rare weapons.

Well some dungeons do seem like they were originally intended to be large explorable mazes. Takes AC for example. If the paths weren’t there, and all the arbitrary blockades were removed, you’d just have one very large dungeon. But its like they made a last minute decision to split all dungeons into paths.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Well some dungeons do seem like they were originally intended to be large explorable mazes. Takes AC for example. If the paths weren’t there, and all the arbitrary blockades were removed, you’d just have one very large dungeon. But its like they made a last minute decision to split all dungeons into paths.

I agree it seems the dungeons were first designed to be really explorable mazes and then during late developement were turned in the railroaded path running we have today. Imho it is a shame as a real dungeon could have so much potential.

Imagine if it was really explorable and if the dungeon path were due to way you really choose in the maze rather than to a railroaded scenario you pick at the beginning. Bosses would be at their place because they dwell there, you could kill them, stelth around them (without loot of course) orlure them to another faction (yay troll fighting Kohler).
You could have skippable mobs, unskippable ones, JP for shortcuts etc.
Players could choose to do all bosses, just some of them, only the last boss in whichever order they want. They could come back to some boss or whatever they want untill they choose to leave. As rewards you could have boss chests, random chests mob drops…

It would be so much fun as long as you can agree with your group on the run you want to do. My dream dungeon. To bad they changed their mind at the end as i think that is what they envisionned in the early days of developement.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Well some dungeons do seem like they were originally intended to be large explorable mazes. Takes AC for example. If the paths weren’t there, and all the arbitrary blockades were removed, you’d just have one very large dungeon. But its like they made a last minute decision to split all dungeons into paths.

That’s why AC story has seen some of the more interesting speedruns, since there’s an opportunity to split up and kill three bosses at once. I’d love to see more of that.

Imagine Arah with no invis walls, no gates, and all bosses spawned and ready to fight. Mmmm. Who wants to see abom fight tar?

And <3 that post, Jerus. The devs are probably as frustrated as we are about the policies and direction ArenaNet has taken in the last couple years (and if glassdoor is to be trusted, they definitely are).

dlonie.6547:

The devs are probably as frustrated as we are about the policies and direction ArenaNet has taken in the last couple years (and if glassdoor is to be trusted, they definitely are).

Probably. Although keep in mind that Glassdoor has reviews of ex employees, who don’t usually leave positive reviews in general. Then again, they do all seem to agree on the same criticism.

terminatorkobold.6031:

Imagine if it was really explorable and if the dungeon path were due to way you really choose in the maze rather than to a railroaded scenario you pick at the beginning. Bosses would be at their place because they dwell there, you could kill them, stealth around them (without loot of course) orlure them to another faction (yay troll fighting Kohler).
You could have skippable mobs, unskippable ones, JP for shortcuts etc.
Players could choose to do all bosses, just some of them, only the last boss in whichever order they want. They could come back to some boss or whatever they want untill they choose to leave. As rewards you could have boss chests, random chests mob drops…

It would be so much fun as long as you can agree with your group on the run you want to do. My dream dungeon. To bad they changed their mind at the end as i think that is what they envisionned in the early days of developement.

I agree completely. This would be so much fun. You could have short runs where you kill only one boss, or long runs where you try to kill all bosses.

Additionally, I would give each boss one unique drop, and increase the chances of rare loot for each boss that the players kill. So they could save the boss with their intended reward for last. The more bosses they kill in the dungeon, the better the loot gets.

There’s some other stuff that could be done of course. There’s the encounter design, but also the obstacles in the dungeon itself. There’s not enough switches, gates, puzzles, traps, and interesting rooms to keep it interesting. Some randomized keys and locked doors would add a lot in this respect, plus randomized bonus chests that encourage exploration.

You could still skip to a particular boss if you want, but the alternative would at least be encouraged.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

dlonie.6547:

The devs are probably as frustrated as we are about the policies and direction ArenaNet has taken in the last couple years (and if glassdoor is to be trusted, they definitely are).

Probably. Although keep in mind that Glassdoor has reviews of ex employees, who don’t usually leave positive reviews in general. Then again, they do all seem to agree on the same criticism.

This is definitely something to keep in mind, but not always true. Current employees post reviews on it as well, and ex-employee doesn’t have to mean disgruntled employee — the company I work for has nothing but glowing reviews from former employees who left on good terms. If the people are treated right, they have good things to say.

But yeah. Excessively negative reviews that lack detail and just sort of generally say “this place sucks” should be dismissed as bad employees, IMO. But the ArenaNet reviews tend to have quite detailed, balanced, and (as you mentioned) consistent criticism. It seems the game industry in general tends to chew their people up and spit them out when they’re finished with them, which is quite unfortunate :-(

Well, it’s a highly competitive industry. Competitive=brings out the mean, the petty, sometimes the downright cruel parts of men.
Nothing scares me more than a competitive, goal-oriented, overachieving person. OR firm. Or industry. Whatever, you got me.

“In addition to this, major focus started to be spent on developing the Chinese version of Guild Wars 2. In fact a recent patch, adapted to that system, caused major outcries in the GW2 community in the rest of the world due to it adding mandatory tutorials & mangling story content. It was a concern for me while I was there how a different country was essentially pushing around the design direction for the rest of the world (& I felt weird that all game content had to be approved by the Chinese government before being released). I understand how big of a market it is but it felt like it pushed an entirely separate agenda.”

Hmmm.
There are other interesting things. Oh, like this

“The politics and overworked environment have caused quite a few people to leave. Almost everyone who helped make Guild Wars and helped launch Guild Wars 2 are gone. You now have a company that trusts analytics and data over people’s intuition or that listened to their community. People feel like their complaints are not being heard and many feel frustrated in their lot at the company.”

I wonder if this is some kind of fake review done by a player, because so many actually get this very impression from just playing the game/following the forum/other. I mean, I surely do.
It might be fake… /scratches head

dlonie.6547:

It seems the game industry in general tends to chew their people up and spit them out when they’re finished with them, which is quite unfortunate :-(

Yup, welcome to the game industry.

There’s also reviews that describe how Anet would often just divide teams into smaller teams, with no clear indication what everyone’s position is, and who reports to whom. So suddenly seniors have to report to lower level employees for a particular project. Also, a lot of shuffling around of teams, and people being pulled off projects, to work on something different. This is a phenomenon that I’ve experienced myself in a game company once, it is very recognizable, and it doesn’t work.

Has anyone seen my stapler?

deSade.9437:

Well, it’s a highly competitive industry. Competitive=brings out the mean, the petty, sometimes the downright cruel parts of men.
Nothing scares me more than a competitive, goal-oriented, overachieving person. OR firm. Or industry. Whatever, you got me.

It’s mostly just general producer/ceo/manager office politics and experimentation. It can be very frustrating for employees, who just want a stable environment where they are paid the industry standard (so they can pay their rent) and work on the same thing consistently, with the same leads and same colleagues.

There’s also a review that describes that they got a brand new PS4 for Christmas, while they were struggling to pay their rent with the wages they got. So they had to sell the PS4 to pay the rent. That is a clear sign of a CEO out of touch with its employees.

I’m a developer by trade (and a chemist by training, go figure), and I wanted to get into the game industry…until I started looking at employee reviews of major studios. Not. Worth. It. So instead I work with scientists making analysis/vis software for their research. I’d love to work on a cutting edge rendering engine, but my employer treats me like a person and values my work. In the end, that’s a way better way to live your life, IMO.

Along the lines of Jerus’s post (and similar posts I’ve made over the years), my heart goes out to the devs for GW2. They are very talented and do really great work, especially on the content delivered around launch. It’s the direction of the company that’s causing the problems.

I wonder what would happen if they sent out a “player satisfaction survey” to everyone who has a license for GW2. It might be a real eye opener for them and their metrics. As it stands, they claim “no one likes dungeons, so we’re not going to focus on them.” How do they know that? I’ve never heard of them asking players what they want — they just look at statistics and metrics, and there’s no way to tell why content is unpopular from that information.

It’s all so…ugh.

Jerus.4350:

I will say, players always have a different perspective than the devs. And the statement “devs are so out of touch” will ALWAYS hold true. Why? Because of a simple fact, that devs know how it’s SUPPOSED to work, players know how it works. Devs won’t look for that little niche situation of awesomeness, players will stumble upon it and abuse the ever living kitten out of it. So there’s that giant hurdle to jump over and I doubt any dev is able to completely overcome it, if one does, well we got a genius on our hands and he probably shouldn’t’ be working for a gaming company and instead be making millions doing something a bit more important. To take a quote from the video “it’s just video games”.

That’s why devs should have their game tested. Properly tested before they release content for it.

During the Season 1 LS almost every release had an exploitable bug that they quickly fixed 1-2 days later. That’s all good but the guys who got in on it got the goods.

They simply need to have some players TEST the content. It’s not that hard. I would gladly do it – and there are many others who would.

Pay me a 10 gold fee for each exploit/bug and I’ll gladly do it. It really is that easy to find people to fix the game and rid it of bugs.

Harper.4173:

That’s why devs should have their game tested. Properly tested before they release content for it.

During the Season 1 LS almost every release had an exploitable bug that they quickly fixed 1-2 days later. That’s all good but the guys who got in on it got the goods.

They simply need to have some players TEST the content. It’s not that hard. I would gladly do it – and there are many others who would.

Pay me a 10 gold fee for each exploit/bug and I’ll gladly do it. It really is that easy to find people to fix the game and rid it of bugs.

They test it. But when it goes live you have hundred of thousands of ppl testing it during several hours. You can’t do that with paid people and you can’t really make an open beta for each big update to the game. Testing will find some problem before release, but of course the players by shear numbers will always find more stuff that testing can even dream to find.

Thaddeus.4891:

They test it.

Molten Facility says hi.

Just having a tester party do a single run through modified dungeons/fractals before going live to check for unavoidable progress blockers seems an obvious thing to test, and yet…

Thaddeus.4891:

Harper.4173:

That’s why devs should have their game tested. Properly tested before they release content for it.

During the Season 1 LS almost every release had an exploitable bug that they quickly fixed 1-2 days later. That’s all good but the guys who got in on it got the goods.

They simply need to have some players TEST the content. It’s not that hard. I would gladly do it – and there are many others who would.

Pay me a 10 gold fee for each exploit/bug and I’ll gladly do it. It really is that easy to find people to fix the game and rid it of bugs.

They test it. But when it goes live you have hundred of thousands of ppl testing it during several hours. You can’t do that with paid people and you can’t really make an open beta for each big update to the game. Testing will find some problem before release, but of course the players by shear numbers will always find more stuff that testing can even dream to find.

They test it for bugs – but do it poorly. They don’t go in there with the mindset of breaking it for profit. That’s the difference.

If players were paid to find the bugs – and paid well – they would attempt anything and everything to break it and eventually would.
They can do this and can do it with a few select players with the vast majority never knowing about it. The only reason I feel they’re not is because the bugs are too many.

Out of the hundreds of people who do the content – or the thousands – very few actually play the content in order to deliberately break it for a profit or an advantage. So numbers aren’t that relevant.

A few dedicated players can test for and find what a hundreds can in an open beta. They just need motivation -a fee for each bug/exploit found seems reasonable.

Testers always test to see if it works. Rarely do testers go into a test thinking " I want to break this content so badly I’ll throw everything I have at it".

I think it’s more a problem of unreasonably tight deadlines, that make it impossible to give content the amount of testing it deserves.

You say they test content. Good. Explain to me how could they possibly NOT SEE that there was a freaking CHECKPOINT NOT WORKING in the thaum fractal? You telling me they never, not once, died and had to ress back? Is that to be called testing? How could they NOT NOTICE that a freaking WAYPOINT in ac was OUT OF THE MAP? That was visibile from the get go, from the beginning of the dungeon. You just had to look.
Ahhh, you know what? Whatever. Bugs aren’t the biggest problem. HoT sinking like a pirate ship after a cannon fight is.

deSade.9437:

How could they NOT NOTICE that a freaking WAYPOINT in ac was OUT OF THE MAP?

lol, what? More info please xD

deSade.9437:

You say they test content. Good. Explain to me how could they possibly NOT SEE that there was a freaking CHECKPOINT NOT WORKING in the thaum fractal? You telling me they never, not once, died and had to ress back? Is that to be called testing? How could they NOT NOTICE that a freaking WAYPOINT in ac was OUT OF THE MAP? That was visibile from the get go, from the beginning of the dungeon. You just had to look.
Ahhh, you know what? Whatever. Bugs aren’t the biggest problem. HoT sinking like a pirate ship after a cannon fight is.

It probably was working just fine. Then the test team discovered a bug, so that bug got fixed, which broke the checkpoint by accident, and then they didn’t test it again.

This happens quite often with bug fixing. A fix can always break something else. Of course it is good practice to also test thoroughly after implementing a fix, but tight deadlines often do not allow for it.

pdavis.8031:

NikeEU.7690:

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Even a professional surgeon isn’t necessarily better at performing surgery than your average invested intelligent patient.

You know if that were true, no game company would care about degrees in game design, or work experience in the game industry.

That’s a false equivalence. Surgeons, and other professionals, are licensed by the government and/or professional associations in order to be legally allowed to practice their trade. As far as I know, there is no such barrier of entry for game designers.

A more fitting comparison would be a game designer with a cook at a restaurant. Some go to culinary school. Some start washing dishes at an Applebees. Some game designers go to college. Some start by being QA testers.

Most people will care very much where their surgeon is certified. Most will not care where their chef was trained.

Actually a chef and/or cook has to be licensed by either the local city or state government in order to work with food. They need to be legally allowed to work with food. And know the various cooking temps and proper procedures for handling food.

Of course the requirements are different in each state, but generally at the very least the business owner and/or manager are required to have one.

This is news to me and I worked as the cook at al local restaurant/pizza place for over a year. My training was basically “this is where stuff is, then you make the food” and it was fine.

dlonie.6547:

deSade.9437:

How could they NOT NOTICE that a freaking WAYPOINT in ac was OUT OF THE MAP?

lol, what? More info please xD

Eh, it was years ago. They kittened up the coordinates of a wp or something. I think it was the first waypoint, the one where you pick the path. It was LITERALLY out of the map, meaning that you could see it completely out of the zone, buried many steps in solid rock.
Obviously inaccessible. If you clicked on it nothing happened (at least…).
Presuming that I accept the excuse of “it broke only when the patch went on the live servers” (I don’t, but let’s assume I do): do you have ANY idea how much it took them to fix it?
Heh.

P.S. Funniest video ever: is it just me by The Darkness… I want to buy a wedding gown.

For Lupi’s sake how is this thread still alive?

I know you guys want to bring VGM back, but he’s not coming back for us… Let it go guys…

deSade.9437:

Obviously inaccessible. If you clicked on it nothing happened (at least…).

Aww, well that’s disappointing.

do you have ANY idea how much it took them to fix it?

Hmm…updating coordinates in a json/xml/whatever file…let’s see…

It’d take an El Sobrante Fortnight: between two weeks and a decade.

Remember Arah P1 tar waypoint? That was what…1.5-2 years that it wouldn’t spawn until the Stargazer died, and made everyone hate pugging that path?

You know what guys, it’s clearly pointless whether or not they test. There are so many bugs found in the live environment that get ignored for months or years that it’s entirely possible that the testers can and do find all of these things.

Quickfoot Katana.8642:

For Lupi’s sake how is this thread still alive?

I know you guys want to bring VGM back, but he’s not coming back for us… Let it go guys…

Oh, the thread’s done, OP hasn’t posted in days.

We’re just circle/ /jerking and cuddling in the afterglow, whispering filthy things about ArenaNet in each others’ ears until somekitty reports the thread and a mod closes it.

With Anet’s recent move to make dungeon’s less lucrative, this is the perfect opportunity to bring this thread back.

If stacking is stopped by implementing player collision, the time to complete a dungeon would be greatly increased. Those players who speed run by bypassing mobs will not get the treasure rewards from killing the mobs. It’s a simple solution that leaves dungeons worthwhile to play, but keeps people from getting all the loot in ten minutes.

Derenek.8931:

If stacking is stopped by implementing player collision, the time to complete a dungeon would be greatly increased. Those players who speed run by bypassing mobs will not get the treasure rewards from killing the mobs. It’s a simple solution that leaves dungeons worthwhile to play, but keeps people from getting all the loot in ten minutes.

Optimal tactic is to not stack, there goes the first idea. Considering the drops from mobs are terrible, speed running for a reduced reward would still be the best choice, or do something else if the nerf is big enough.

Your aware stacking doesn’t raise group dps right?

Iris Ng.9845:

Casmurro.9046:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jEAUIiD4DHw

This! It speaks louder than any of us. Re-quoted

Great video

thrag.9740:

Your aware stacking doesn’t raise group dps right?

Yes, it just concentrates the entire focus of the action onto a single point. So all boons, buffs, conditions, and damage is all in one single spot.

Total damage of course is exactly the same, but the effect of all that damage hitting simultaneously is a lot different than that same damage spread over a greater area.

Say for instance there are 5 elite mobs with 50k hp each. If players didnt stack, those mobs would have to be individually taken down. Which would mean players would have to output 250k damage. However with stacking, all the mobs enter one spot, so the players can kill all 5 with only 50k damage.

There is a huge difference.

Derenek.8931:

thrag.9740:

Your aware stacking doesn’t raise group dps right?

Yes, it just concentrates the entire focus of the action onto a single point. So all boons, buffs, conditions, and damage is all in one single spot.

Total damage of course is exactly the same, but the effect of all that damage hitting simultaneously is a lot different than that same damage spread over a greater area.

Say for instance there are 5 elite mobs with 50k hp each. If players didnt stack, those mobs would have to be individually taken down. Which would mean players would have to output 250k damage. However with stacking, all the mobs enter one spot, so the players can kill all 5 with only 50k damage.

There is a huge difference.

AoE pulls and cleaving mobs in a lot of cases is faster than waiting for everything to ball up in a corner. The only place I can think of where it is worth Line of Sighting is the first few trash mobs in CoE and the trash after the 4 champions in SE P2.

Stacking together to increase the effectiveness of AOE is older than video games.