Guild Wars 2

Substance E.4852:

Vayne.8563:

fellyn.5083:

Vayne.8563:

Most people are looking at Guild Wars 1 from the point of view of four products not one. Though Guild Wars Prophecies was a good game, it took many years before the game really came into it’s own.

That is to say, a lot of people liked Nightfall and Eye of the North more than Prophecies. Not everyone, but a lot.

Nightfall didn’t come out until a year an a half after Prophecies.

Guild Wars 1 WAS a great game. But some of the things that made it great, also made it niche…and it was niche. It was never a household name.

A lot of the stuff you see in Guild Wars 2 is an attempt to deal with the shortcomings of Guild Wars 1. As an example…the skill system.

Guild Wars 1 had to very big problems with skills. There were too many of them, and with the dual profession system it was literally impossible to balance skills. People complain about the inbalance in Guild Wars 2 but they never had to deal with the permasin, or even sabway. Guild Wars 1 had serious balance issues and less skills meant more control by Anet, which is what they wanted. But there was another problem.

Many people couldn’t figure out how to make a decent build. There really were too many skills and not everyone is capable of making a build. I’m a guy who loved to make builds. That’s what I did half the time. Make new builds. But at the same time I was doing an enjoying this, other builds were ruining the game for me, particularly because if you didn’t run Build A you weren’t going to be finding a group to do the Underworld. Everyone only wanted specific builds so they could do speed clears. It was pretty obnoxious.

So Anet lost a lot of people to the inability to have a build that worked. The solution was tie skills to weapons and introduce less skills at start. This way when they do finally have an expansion and they add skills, there’s more of a chance to keep it balanced and even a total noob can play a build because his weapons have the skills he’ll basically need.

Guild Wars 1 was a great game for a small percentage of the audience. Frankly I think Guild Wars 2 will improve a lot in the years to come, but it’s going to take another six months to a year before it’s the game it should have been at launch.

At one point in it’s life GW1 had well over 5 million players and was competing with WoW for the king of mmos title. How is that niche?

Guild Wars 1 probably never had 5 million people playing at the same time. Don’t confuse 5 million copies sold (a landmark they didn’t hit till like year 4 or 5) with 12.4 million subscribers (and many gamers would even consider WoW niche).

12.4 million subscribers, has nothing to do with boxes sold. Boxes sold includes people like both my sons who played it briefly, and left for WoW.

You can’t use box sales to say whether something is niche or not. Only concurrent players. I seriously doubt Guild Wars 1 had more than 1 million concurrent players at any time.

The word niche only works when you compare pontential players to people playing. Niche doesn’t exist in a background. There are currently according to some estimates 200 million gamers. MMOs by most are still considered niche. Only WoW is close to being not niche.

Consider this. Diablo 3 sold 6.8 million copies in it’s first week on existence, more than Guild Wars 1 sold in 7 years.

Niche is niche.

Diablo III’s level of fan anticipation was somewhere between what people felt for SC2 and what they are feeling for Half Life 3.

If GW had made two other amazing games that had a cult following instead of being the flagship, mold breaking product from a new company, they would have sold a helluva lot more copies than they did.

What does this have to do with it being niche or not. Because that’s the question I was answering. You’re niche or your main stream.

I don’t know that anyone can reasonably argue that Guild Wars 1 was main stream.

I’m not talking about why a game is popular or why it isn’t. I’m talking about the difference between niche games and main stream games.

I’m claiming Guild Wars 1 was a niche game (and Guild Wars 2 is rapidly becoming a niche game as well). That’s all I’m claiming.

Kreslin.6832:

I can’t take mister Vayne’s posts seriously. He/she is blindly protecting GW2, and only GW2. But the truce is that GW2 maybe not so good as he/she think so.

So because YOU say that GW2 isn’t as good as someone else is thinking (personal opinion btw) it must be true right? Why is YOUR opinion somehow more important than that of someone else? Hint: it’s not.

Why they created GW2, a mmorpg, when CORPG GW1 had a success? Why they didn’t create GW2 in GW1 style? Because GW1 had problems? No. Why then? Because mmorpg genre is more popular? Exactly! And why they decided to do that? Think about it.

So this is the typical “I wanted GW1 with better graphics” post, now I get it.

They can fool you, and you even doesn’t notice it and remain happy and don’t get, why so much people are complaining about GW2.

And many more people are not complaining about it, what your point? You just wanted GW1 with better graphics, they made something new and different and you complain about it. If you want to play GW1, play GW1, it’s still active.

Quarktastic.1027:

Kreslin.6832:

Sorry but I disagree. I don’t see the problem. They could do something better and stay on the original business model.

Developing and releasing an entire games’ worth of content in only six months is a tremendous feat, even for the largest of developers. In fact, they didn’t even make their six month deadline for Factions or Nightfall.

…and they haven’t done it in 10 months for GW2….

All they have done is introduce a bunch of vague, poorly-organized, over-grindy, extremely buggy achievements, and a couple of dungeons that were actually kind of decent but then went away.

I’d take something like Factions or Nightfall a couple months late over this crap any day. Or I would have once. No way they’re going to sell me an expansion, now. I’ve got no faith that it will be what they claim, and no faith that it just won’t be something mediocre and grindy.

I think even prior to the Nexon takeover of ANet’s internal logistics, back in the betas, there were enough bad decisions to indicate GW2 was never going to turn out as a true sequel to the first game.

Even if NCSoft hadn’t made its deal with the devil, we’d still be looking at a game with not even half of the depth of the first game. GW2 is basically just a monthly theme park ride now, and I think even if left entirely to their own devices, ANet still would have done almost the same exact thing on their own. Just minus the ridiculously blatant RNG chest events and without any ascended armor, at all.

I’d just take your good memories with GW for what they were. No company will ever have the marketing hype or financing ANet did to change MMOs as a genre. I think GW2 was basically the last chance the gaming market had to move things forward, and that’s gone now. GW1 will always be the little known high point.

I think one of the things I miss most about GW1 is the atmospheric feel of slight despair and immensity that the world conveyed. The world just felt so massive but a lot of it felt really sparse, post searing ascalon for example always felt really somber and creepy. The searing crystal in Pockmark Flats always really intrigued me, it’s so beautiful and massive and the wind riders always kind of terrified me with how fast they float around in packs.

FlamingFoxx.1305:

I think one of the things I miss most about GW1 is the atmospheric feel of slight despair and immensity that the world conveyed. The world just felt so massive but a lot of it felt really sparse, post searing ascalon for example always felt really somber and creepy. The searing crystal in Pockmark Flats always really intrigued me, it’s so beautiful and massive and the wind riders always kind of terrified me with how fast they float around in packs.

My favorite is still Factions for atmosphere. Boy, does Factions have atmosphere!

Edit: they oughta just make a GW1 forum for us to use lol

Quarktastic.1027:

Kreslin.6832:

Sorry but I disagree. I don’t see the problem. They could do something better and stay on the original business model.

Developing and releasing an entire games’ worth of content in only six months is a tremendous feat, even for the largest of developers. In fact, they didn’t even make their six month deadline for Factions or Nightfall.

Okay, I wasn’t talking about business model. My mistake. English is not my language and I’m only studying it, I can be confused in some wordings.
What I was talking about it’s about making GW2 in GW1 style, but more modern, and still corpg, NOT MMORPG.

With instance pve like in GW1, with similar skills like in GW1. I loved GW1 combat system, which didn’t have this stupid auto-attack, this stupid, simple combat system. In GW1 auto-attack without using skills, was nothing. With dual profession, with mobs which have same skills as players, with mob’s AI. With henchmen/heroes, with GW1’s style dungeon, with repeatable missions, which was designed better than GW2’s PS. With ability to hunt monsters for elite skills, which was so exiting! I loved that in instance pve monsters were strolling groups. I loved the fact that groups of monsters made my group’s journey more complicated. I loved how mobs were acting in a battle. I love the fact that mob’s groups could attack my group from two sides and my group could not survive. I loved that fact, that I had to think before leap.
And so on and etcetera. Instance PVE was much more interesting, than open pve in gw2.

Don’t tell me that they couldn’t do more convenient for them… whatever they do, and stay in GW1 style – in CORPG. Because I don’t believe in it.
It’s all about money. MMORPG is a lot more popular genre than CORPG. That’s why they turned CORPG to MMORPG. Because of money, not because of inconvenience… of something with GW1. They could do so much with instance pve in GW2, so much in CORPG in overall.
As a Role-Playing game, MMORPG, with open pve world, will never be equal with offline RPG. MMORPG has it’s own strength, off-line RPG it’s own. That’s why GW1 was so much interesting, so unique. It was perfect combination offline rpg with multi-player and online competitive combat.

And oh, GW1 was more complicated to play, GW2 is more casual. That’s says a lot too.

Yes, as CORPG like GW1, GW2 might haven’t been as popular as it is. But they would have their player base and they could thrive anyway.

Many GW1 players are not satisfy with GW2. Even my friend, who didn’t play GW1, are not satisfy with GW2. He says that GW2 is the same grinding game as Perfect World. It only looks different. He says that GW2 is boring.

GW2 is a commerce game, not game of art, it’s a commerce game.

Off course you can disagree with me, it’s your right, but I will not change my views too. I know how it looks. Why Arena did this. Why did they kill GW1, turned it to mmorpg genre. Why did they take away from GW1’s fans this unique, marvelous project, and make a new one, for other and wider audience. Why they had so much good sells… because not only new ones were waiting GW2, but the old fans too.

It’s a business. MMORPG is more popular genre, for more wider audience. GW2 is a beautiful wrap, but it’s empty in inside. Sorry, I don’t know your’s idiom.

There were no point to turn CORPG to MMORPG. Unless they want to make more money. Because, I’ll repeat once again, MMORPG more popular and more profitable genre. More profitable not because of quality, but because of many tricks.

Arena turned CORPG project to MMORPG because it’s more profitable. That’s the main point. That’s how I see it.
But I would love to see, how would they watch to old fan’s eyes after what they have done. What would they answer to the question “why did you take GW1 from us”.

Guild Wars 1 is not alive, it’s almost dead. They left it on stand-alone mode.

For the record. I’m not saying that GW2 is a crap, bad game. No it isn’t. GW2 is a nice game as a mmorpg, and for now it looks fresh, but as GW1 player, I’m not satisfied. As GW1 player, I feel betrayed. I loved GW1, but Arena took it from me. GW2 is not what I loved. GW2 doesn’t have what I loved in GW1. And probably will never have. Because I don’t believe they care. No they don’t. If they did, they wouldn’t turned CORPG GW1 to MMORPG “sequel”.

By the way. As a CORPG they could be unique as they were. They could be one of their kind and have their own players. But as MMORPG they will have a lot of rivals, so I will not surprised if GW2 will drawn in a future, or if they will be “one of the many”, which will mean not unique.

But don’t listen to me, I’m just complaining. =) My complains won’t change GW2 anyway. All I can do it’s complaining and playing, or leave the game. For now, I’m still playing this game, but I can leave GW2 when it will lose it’s freshness.

Chuo.4238:

FlamingFoxx.1305:

I think one of the things I miss most about GW1 is the atmospheric feel of slight despair and immensity that the world conveyed. The world just felt so massive but a lot of it felt really sparse, post searing ascalon for example always felt really somber and creepy. The searing crystal in Pockmark Flats always really intrigued me, it’s so beautiful and massive and the wind riders always kind of terrified me with how fast they float around in packs.

My favorite is still Factions for atmosphere. Boy, does Factions have atmosphere!

Edit: they oughta just make a GW1 forum for us to use lol

They did, https://forum.guildwars.com/forum/
It’s at least 2 years old.

I’m having more fun in GW2 than I ever did with GW1. GW1 was very beautiful and I did like the storylines but I never cared for the mechanics whether it was deck-building skills or keeping my eyes locked on little icons on the side of the UI. I like GW2’s combat and overall systems far better.

ArenaNet had a choice. Copy GW1’s mechanics with updates and be accused of lacking innovation by the MMO community or do something different. I am very., very glad they chose the latter.

LumAnth.5124:

Pre Searing Ascalon is probably the most beautiful thing my eyes have ever seen.

It was a perfect color blend of blue, yellow, orange and green (with the occasional marble color for buildings)

Not only was it that bright and shiny scene, but it had it’s smudges. The Catacombs is a big example. Another is the Wizard’s Folly mountain, with the mysterious tower. And it’s those smudges that made Pre Searing Ascalon perfect

I have never, ever seen such a place (in a game) in my life as beautiful as that.

Sadly, they tried to recreate the same setting in the Charr Homelands in EoTN, but it wasn’t as good (I thought it was a pretty bad extension, actually)

I still remember the first time I logged onto GW1 in pre-searing ascalon, with a dial-up modem, lagging horribly but in utter awe.

Khisanth.2948:

They did, https://forum.guildwars.com/forum/
It’s at least 2 years old.

Ah, thanks for pointing that out. I must’ve lost that memo…that said, I don’t think that forum has the same purpose as this one…

Chuo.4238:

Khisanth.2948:

They did, https://forum.guildwars.com/forum/
It’s at least 2 years old.

Ah, thanks for pointing that out. I must’ve lost that memo…that said, I don’t think that forum has the same purpose as this one…

The Guild Wars 1 forum is a tech support forum, not a forum for online game discussion.

Main thing I miss was the dual classes and complete build control. You could put together such amazing concepts…. I spent hours just coming up with builds, it was hands down the funnest part for me.
Ironically, it was also the main thing they shredded and threw in the trash for GW2.

FlamingFoxx.1305:

AngryCat.4825:

LumAnth.5124:

Pre Searing Ascalon is probably the most beautiful thing my eyes have ever seen.

It was a perfect color blend of blue, yellow, orange and green (with the occasional marble color for buildings)

Not only was it that bright and shiny scene, but it had it’s smudges. The Catacombs is a big example. Another is the Wizard’s Folly mountain, with the mysterious tower. And it’s those smudges that made Pre Searing Ascalon perfect

I have never, ever seen such a place (in a game) in my life as beautiful as that.

Sadly, they tried to recreate the same setting in the Charr Homelands in EoTN, but it wasn’t as good (I thought it was a pretty bad extension, actually)

Came here to post pretty much this, exactly.

While I believe the Charr homelands weren’t without charm, they simply can’t compare. Still, I find it enchanting that if you tilt your head correctly, and let your eyes space out for a bit, certain parts of GW2’s Ascalonian lands rekindle the magic that was GW1.

….Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go log into GW1 and die horribly because I’m going to be mashing a non-existent dodge key. ;_;

I did this yesterday! I logged into GW1 and just went through tons of different locations for the nostalgia. I kept trying to move during fighting, which as a ritualist was about the most ridiculous thing ever -_-. /jump!

Oh man, the other day I logged into my PvP-only Ele for some good old RA action, after not having logged onto GW1 for months. I figured muscle memory would return. The match started and I saw a warrior charging at me…double-tapped my D key to dodge backwards but didn’t move haha. Warrior meanwhile Bull’s Charged me. I press F2 to go into Water Attunement, end up switching weapon sets.

Needless to say, I didn’t last very long that game haha.

Good times

One thing I would LOVE for them to add that they had in GW1 was the green weapons. However instead of green weapons, just make them unique skins that drop from champions and legendary only. Would make farming the event bosses non dragon more meaningful with people than just some xp and a little big of copper/silver tossed your way.

Would be cool.

Grimwolf.7163:

Main thing I miss was the dual classes and complete build control. You could put together such amazing concepts…. I spent hours just coming up with builds, it was hands down the funnest part for me.
Ironically, it was also the main thing they shredded and threw in the trash for GW2.

It’s not ironic at all..it’s intentional.

The two biggest complaints about Guild Wars 1 (besides not being able to jump) was the lack of the ability of the team to balance the game (and believe me the balance was much worse than Guild Wars 2 currently is) and the fact that new players didn’t know how to make builds.

For those who loved to make builds (like me) that game was a bit of paradise, but far more people didn’t want to do that at all, or like them. They wanted to play and that’s it. What’s why you saw people in game all the time asking for people to ping them builds.

This made the game very user unfriendly, and a lot of people simply walked away because they couldn’t make a build to save their lives.

Speaking of gw1, I wonder what happened to Shiny? Can’t wait for him to make a comeback when we reach Elona

A very very small minority of people liked spending hours coming up with builds. It is the entire reason PvX wiki was so incredibly popular.

CobaltSixty.1542:

A very very small minority of people liked spending hours coming up with builds. It is the entire reason PvX wiki was so incredibly popular.

Are you sure about that “very very small minority?” What is your data for that conclusion? I myself was very inventive when left to my own devices, in both pve and pvp. Not always successful but always experimental. It doesn’t mean I didn’t go to pvxwiki for the “ideal” builds for farming etc sometimes. But judging an entire community’s “likes” by the popularity of one website wouldn’t be very reliable, I’d think.

Khisanth.2948:

Dante.1508:

Vayne.8563:

Next thing you know, people will be saying that Alesia was awesome. lol

What was wrong with Alesia?

Tell you what when we start the NPC hate list Trahearne pops to mind far faster than Alesia lol

That is probably because you’ve been playing GW2 much more recently than you’ve have had need to bring Alesia. By the time you meet Trahearne on a non-Sylvari character you should be pretty much trained to know that NPCs are basically useless and Trahearne has some annoying lines but when you have Alesia in the party there was a reason for that.

The problem with Alesia was her skill priorities. She had a tendency to try to res people in the wrong time. The middle of a battle where your party is taking enough damage for someone to be killed is not the greatest time for your only healer to stop everything she is doing and start casting a slow ressurection spell. If you weren’t playing from release it might not be as noticeable, there were a bunch of updates to henchmen and hero AI. In the Crystal Desert section of the game I believe she has(or had, there were also some updates to their skills too) Healing Touch on her bar as well which meant she would try to charge into the thick of things when trying to heal.

Nothing beats Trahearne, even Kormir didn’t beat trahearne.

marnick.4305:

Kryptonite.9376:

Gw2 will never be what gw1 was..

Let me correct that.

Vanilla GW2 will never be what GW1 was after 3 expansions.

And I agree to that. But GW2 is already leaps and bounds beyond vanilla GW1. I have good hopes for expansions.

Vanilla GW2 will never even match Vanilla GW1

Dante.1508:

Nothing beats Trahearne, even Kormir didn’t beat trahearne.

That is harsh. Trahearne is better than Kormir I think. Kormir was just, I mean what even was that. She literally did NOTHING throughout the entire storyline, every single time she accompanied you she never attacked. Then for some bizarre reason she gets to become a god instead of your character who has already beaten the Lich and Shiro…. Just, what even was that. I can’t even process the insanity. I hate you Kormir, so much.

Just looking at those loading screens from GW1 made me smile.

Pre-searing Ascalon was the best game ever. I don’t know what game everyone else is talking about..

Gonna kitten in a few cereal bowls here but been a long time owner of gw1 with all its expansions and have been a long time MMOrpg lover since everquest first came out. I really see no comparison, GW2 beats GW1 in all aspects. It is worlds more sociable, and you are way more free to do what you want then you were in gw1. Even if you want to sit around and do nothing, doing it in a persistent world is just more fun.

Dante.1508:

marnick.4305:

Kryptonite.9376:

Gw2 will never be what gw1 was..

Let me correct that.

Vanilla GW2 will never be what GW1 was after 3 expansions.

And I agree to that. But GW2 is already leaps and bounds beyond vanilla GW1. I have good hopes for expansions.

Vanilla GW2 will never even match Vanilla GW1

For your type of play style. But then, for my type of play style, Guild Wars 2 vanilla easily surprasses Guild Wars 1.

For example pathing just sucks. Totally sucks. I could never really feel the world is real because I mostly couldn’t go off road.

Here’s the brave ranger, going through the wilderness. Yes, I’m a master of the wilds. Oh look, a log. Guess I have to turn back.

Yeah, Guild Wars 1 was awesome for explorers.

There were also so many things which it did completely and utterly wrong which nearly every GW1 player has blinded themselves to for the sake of nostalgia.

Thank you Vayne and others for making a thread that’s SUPPOSE to be nostalgic aesthetics into another stupid “Mechanics gw2 vs Mechanics gw1”

Seriously. I hope a moderator would just lock this thread. There were many other “mechanics” argument thread…

LumAnth.5124:

Thank you Vayne and others for making a thread that’s SUPPOSE to be nostalgic aesthetics into another stupid “Mechanics gw2 vs Mechanics gw1”

Seriously. I hope a moderator would just lock this thread. There were many other “mechanics” argument thread…

I’m having a conversation. There have been other nostalgic Guild Wars 1 threads too. And until people start coming into them and saying how much better it was than Guild Wars 2, I’m happy to be nostalgic too. But when people start glorifying the game, while forgetting it’s faults, yeah, I have something to say about it.

How come you’re not annoyed at the people who come into threads and derail them by saying Guild Wars 1 is better than Guild Wars 2?

Vayne.8563:

LumAnth.5124:

Thank you Vayne and others for making a thread that’s SUPPOSE to be nostalgic aesthetics into another stupid “Mechanics gw2 vs Mechanics gw1”

Seriously. I hope a moderator would just lock this thread. There were many other “mechanics” argument thread…

I’m having a conversation. There have been other nostalgic Guild Wars 1 threads too. And until people start coming into them and saying how much better it was than Guild Wars 2, I’m happy to be nostalgic too. But when people start glorifying the game, while forgetting it’s faults, yeah, I have something to say about it.

How come you’re not annoyed at the people who come into threads and derail them by saying Guild Wars 1 is better than Guild Wars 2?

No you are glorifying GW2 and ignoring all the blatant faults IT has. GW1 is the better game. And no I am NOT talking about the whole package like you like to claim people do. As an explorer I loath GW2 exploration. Everything is fed with a silver spoon to people.

Yeah i agree, GW1 is more enchanting than GW2, graphicwise. The models in GW2 are better though and the graphic is better, just alot more “painted”

Dante.1508:

Khisanth.2948:

Dante.1508:

Vayne.8563:

Next thing you know, people will be saying that Alesia was awesome. lol

What was wrong with Alesia?

Tell you what when we start the NPC hate list Trahearne pops to mind far faster than Alesia lol

That is probably because you’ve been playing GW2 much more recently than you’ve have had need to bring Alesia. By the time you meet Trahearne on a non-Sylvari character you should be pretty much trained to know that NPCs are basically useless and Trahearne has some annoying lines but when you have Alesia in the party there was a reason for that.

The problem with Alesia was her skill priorities. She had a tendency to try to res people in the wrong time. The middle of a battle where your party is taking enough damage for someone to be killed is not the greatest time for your only healer to stop everything she is doing and start casting a slow ressurection spell. If you weren’t playing from release it might not be as noticeable, there were a bunch of updates to henchmen and hero AI. In the Crystal Desert section of the game I believe she has(or had, there were also some updates to their skills too) Healing Touch on her bar as well which meant she would try to charge into the thick of things when trying to heal.

Nothing beats Trahearne, even Kormir didn’t beat trahearne.

That is debatable. If Trahearne dies you have no reason to care. If Kormir dies you have to restart the mission. Kormir is also an expert at pulling extra unwanted mobs while being just as useless.

Conner.4702:

Vayne.8563:

LumAnth.5124:

Thank you Vayne and others for making a thread that’s SUPPOSE to be nostalgic aesthetics into another stupid “Mechanics gw2 vs Mechanics gw1”

Seriously. I hope a moderator would just lock this thread. There were many other “mechanics” argument thread…

I’m having a conversation. There have been other nostalgic Guild Wars 1 threads too. And until people start coming into them and saying how much better it was than Guild Wars 2, I’m happy to be nostalgic too. But when people start glorifying the game, while forgetting it’s faults, yeah, I have something to say about it.

How come you’re not annoyed at the people who come into threads and derail them by saying Guild Wars 1 is better than Guild Wars 2?

No you are glorifying GW2 and ignoring all the blatant faults IT has. GW1 is the better game. And no I am NOT talking about the whole package like you like to claim people do. As an explorer I loath GW2 exploration. Everything is fed with a silver spoon to people.

I’ve listed many of Guild Wars 2’s faults. You’re blatantly ignoring those posts. And any explorer who wants to can turn off the map markings and explore to their heart’s content.

You’re accusing others of bias without acknowledging your own bias.